How To Access Facebook In Vietnam For Mac
Before getting started This article is a complete guide that is updated monthly on how to easily access Google, Facebook, WhatsApp, Youtube and other websites that are blocked in China, using a VPN. The first part of this article explains what a VPN is, the simplest and most effective way to access the Internet without restrictions. The second part is a of, and, in our opinion one of the best VPN providers for China. We compare the prices, functionality and performance of the four VPN. We also give a and show the results of the. On top of that, you will find multiple sections to help you evaluate and optimize your VPN and in general which types of websites are blocked in China.
Important: Many of the VPN services mentioned in the article have offered us exclusive deals for our readers. To get the discount, all you have to do is access the VPN service’s website via one of the links that you’ll find in this article.
What VPN do we recommend for China?.: A VPN that’s easy to use, fast and which has proven to be one of the most reliable VPNs for China over the past years.: A VPN with an excellent quality to price ratio, good performance in China and numerous options for a secure connection.: A VPN that is very complete and easy to use. It has a good performance in China if you choose the right server.: A VPN that’s less popular in China and a bit difficult to use, but which has one of the best performances on the market at a very low price. Important: Due to the increased restrictions to VPN which came into effect in October 2017, you should always keep your VPN updated in order to make sure it works at its best. What is a VPN and why do I need one in China? As you probably already know, the internet doesn’t work like we would like it to in China and a large number of websites are blocked by the “Great Firewall.” Among the websites that you can’t access there are Facebook, WhatsApp, YouTube, Twitter and Google+. There are many other blocked websites, and depending on what you do, it may be virtually impossible for you to work in China without a VPN.
The most striking case is probably that of Google.com, which often returns an error message when used from within the Middle Kingdom. But there is still hope In order to solve this problem, you can install a VPN, which masks your I.P. Address so that your laptop appears to be connected from the U.S. Or Japan even if you are in China. A VPN will allow you to bypass the firewall and access any website you want. However, you need to choose wisely: even though there are dozens of VPN services available, only a few work well in China.
We have tested several of them for years and today we’re going to review the four we like the most. Currently, using a VPN is the easiest and most efficient way to access the Internet without restrictions in China When should I install the VPN? We recommend installing the VPN before traveling to China, because if you wait until you get to China, it will be more difficult to install the VPN app on your smart phone, as Google Play is blocked and the Apple App Store doesn’t let you download these apps when you’re in China! What are the best VPN for China and which should I choose? In a nutshell, if you are looking for a VPN that has good performance, that’s easy to set up and has servers in many countries, we recommend you use. Has similar performance, but has less servers.
The third option is, which offers a reliable and cheaper option to ExpressVPN and VyprVPN. Finally is another smaller VPN service provider less popular but offers an excellent performance in China at a very competitive price (although it is a bit difficult to set up properly). To avoid any problem it is better to install and contract the VPN before going to China Even though there are several free options such as Freegate (which is actually a proxy, not a VPN), they aren’t at all reliable and are extremely slow. The practical result is that by resorting to a free option, you won’t be able to do anything other than checking your Facebook or Twitter feeds. Even posting a comment on Facebook will become an impossible task. Forget about watching a YouTube video. Recently, several free VPN have been released that might offer decent performance.
Our suggestion is to consider your decision carefully before installing one of them on your laptop or smartphone as in many cases, they’ll install other applications, such as programs that cause pop-up ads when you are surfing the internet, programs that store your browsing data to sell it to third parties or in the worst cases, programs that use your computer as a server (with the result that both your laptop and internet connection will work much more slowly). Since they only cost a few dollars per month, the best option is without a doubt to get a decent VPN service. Nowadays, there are a large number of VPN services on the market. During the years we’ve spent in China, we have tested many of them, such as Witopia (which was really good back in 2010), Astrill (probably the most popular in 2011/2012), Webmaster and others. Regardless of what the reviews that you find on the web say, many of them don’t work anymore because the Great Firewall is being constantly updated and is becoming more difficult to bypass every day. Many reviews you find are outdated or written by people that never went to China; therefore, check the publication date and whether the website specializes on China before believing the review!
Not all VPNs work in China, and when choosing a VPN, make sure that it has been tested in China over the past months Since 2013 and up until recently, we were using, and we must say that until then, we had never had many problems. However, during the past few years, many better VPN have appeared when it comes to using them from China. As of January 2014, we also started to use, and rediscovered the pleasure of having internet on our cellphones. Since January 2015, due to the attack suffered by multiple VPN providers, we started to also use, to have an alternative with services similar to VyprVPN, and to date, it has turned out to be the most reliable. In October 2015, we started to also use which worked very well up until 2017.
Starting in August 2017 and above all in October, many VPN started to encounter problems (such as PureVPN), and because of this, we started to test, which was one of the VPN that held out the best and which continues to offer good services. At the beginning of 2018 there was an intensification of internet use restrictions and some of the most reliable and popular VPN suffered attacks getting to partially affect its service by short periods of time. For this reason, we decided to test less popular VPN that could also offer good performance in China. Undoubtedly was the one that offered the best results. Important update: March 2018 marked the end of a 14-month process during which all Internet access services – including VPN – that weren’t previously authorized were closed. Almost all VPN with headquarters in China were closed, including Green VPN, a VPN that was quite widely used in China. The majority of VPN services are located outside of China and for the time being, there are no reasons to believe that they will have problems in the near future.
Why are ExpressVPN, VyprVPN, NordVPN, and VPNArea are the best VPN for China?. First of all, they work: as we’ve already stated, we test the four of them often, so if one of them stops working in China, we’ll update this article. They are fast: We tested many VPN and we have to say that ExpressVPN, VyprVPN and NordVPN are the fastest ones that we’ve used. They are stable: Once you’re connected, it’s very rare to lose the connection (this is a major issue with most VPN out there). They offer excellent post-sale service: If you have any doubt or problem with your connection, you can chat with a technician at any moment.
Just head to the website of the VPN that you bought and send an inquiry. Usually, the support team will find a solution within hours (it can also be within 30 minutes if the problem has an easy solution). They offer a large number of protocols and servers: It’s an important detail because the Great Firewall is being constantly updated. Therefore, even if your VPN works today, nobody can assure you that it will work tomorrow. Having the possibility to choose from different protocols and servers provides you with much more flexibility.
Therefore, it’s more likely that your VPN will make it through the next firewall update. The best VPN for China Limited-Time Discount Offer We are now offering an exclusive discount for ExpressVPN: if you buy ExpressVPN’s yearly package, you’ll get 3 months for free and only pay 6.67 USD per month. This offer is limited, so you had better take advantage of it right now and then clicking on the “Get ExpressVPN” button!
The best VPN for China depends on your needs. Carefully compare the services offered by each of them. If you’re looking for a fast VPN, then ExpressVPN is, in our experience, the fastest VPN from China at the moment. Also, it offers you the highest number of servers close to China (the closer the server, the fastest your connection will be, on principle). It has also been the VPN that in our experience has best withstood the constant updates to the Great Firewall.
If having internet on your smartphone or tablet is a key feature for you, then you should go for Express VPN or VyprVPN. If you’re looking for a user-friendly VPN then, once more, ExpressVPN is the easiest of the four VPN to use. If you need a secure connection for transmitting sensitive data, then you should go for VyprVPN Premium, which offers more protocols including Chameleon, which is especially designed for China, and Nat Firewall, for an extra layer of security.
If you all you care about is the price, then VPNArea is cheapest option. ExpressVPN Speed, reliability, ease-of-use, stability in China, number of servers and technical service Price and simultaneous connections ExpressVPN is without a doubt, as of today, the most popular VPN in China and the one that we usually recommend for the majority of users. It’s a VPN that’s very easy to use and offers a service that rarely has problems, even with the poorest Internet connections and during periods of severe Internet use restrictions.
The few times that problems come up with the connection, its excellent technical service tends to resolve them quickly and efficiently. Without a doubt, it’s a VPN for people that don’t want complications. VyprVPN Speed, security, its own servers and the Chameleon protocol Technical service VyprVPN is definitely one of the best VPNs for China, especially if you’re interested in having the most secure connection possible, as it offers its own servers, its own encryption protocol (Chameleon™) and an additional security layer with Firewall NAT. However, it is not as reliable as ExpressVPN, especially on poor quality connections.
Over the past years, it has had problems with the Great Firewall on a few occasions, but they have resolved this quickly. NordVPN Simultaneous connections, ease-of-use, security and dedicated IP addresses Price and stability NordVPN is one of the VPNs that offers the best services in China, and is very complete, fast and easy to use. However, in China, it occasionally has problems with stability, and some servers don’t work very well. During times when restrictions are increased, it holds out quite well, although it has had problems at times. While the price is a bit high, its extra security and anonymity options are worth it. Undoubtedly, it’s a VPN to keep in mind, especially if you’re looking for the possibility of having a dedicated IP address. VPN Area Speed, stability, price, dedicated IP addresses, simultaneous connections and extra options Ease-of-use and website VPN Area is definitely a very high-quality VPN (stable, very fast and reliable) at a very reasonable price.
In addition, it tends to be less well-known than the previous VPNs, which makes it less likely to be targeted by the Great Firewall. However, it’s quite difficult to configure it to get it to work properly in China without the help of its technical service, and its website is not very up-to-date. VPN Area is not recommendable for “beginners,” but it’s a VPN to keep in mind if you’re looking for an efficient alternative to the main VPN providers. AstrillVPN Speed, private IP addresses, and StealthVPN protocol Technical service and assistance, reliability, number of servers and price Astrill is without a doubt one of the most popular VPNs in China. In the past, its excellent services and low price made it an extremely popular VPN among foreigners in China. However, its recent increase in prices (it has turned into one of the most expensive VPNs) and the constant attacks from the Great Firewall (it has stopped working on multiple occasions) combined with its terrible after-sales service have made many people stop using it.
TunnelBear Security, free plan Performance in China, number of servers TunnelBear is the best and safest free VPN that exists in the market. It is ideal for those who only need a limited use of the Internet in China (for example send text messages with WhatsApp). Its performance is a bit poor in China, especially for iOS devices. Which is the fastest VPN in China? Determining which VPN is the fastest is quite a complicated question, as it depends on a lot of factors (encryption protocol, Chinese city from which you are connecting, the website you want to visit, and the VPN server you connect to, among many other factors). In the tests that we have carried out, ExpressVPN tends to be the fastest To respond to this question, over the past months, we have been testing from within China the connection speed of the four VPN that we recommend.
To do so, we have calculated the ping, download speed and upload speed while connected to different servers of these VPN when accessing websites located in the USA, Europe, and Hong Kong. While the results obtained are complicated to interpret due to the high number of parameters involved, we have been able to come to some conclusions:. The four VPN offer good connection speeds: In general, tests show a ping of less than 250 ms and upload and download speeds which in the majority of cases are better than speeds without a VPN. ExpressVPN seems to be the fastest VPN: In the different tests that we carried out, in the majority of cases, ExpressVPN is the VPN that offers the best results for the three indicators (ping, download speed and upload speed), while in some cases VyprVPN and VPN Area have similar or even better results for download speed.
The values of the tests vary greatly: In China, the connection speed varies greatly depending on the day and time, and this affects the performance of the VPN. In addition, speeds can vary also depending on the server you are connected to and where the website or data source you are accessing is located. While ExpressVPN seems to be the fastest, this may depend on the place in China from which you are connecting. If you want to verify the performance of your VPN, in this.
With these results, you will be able to know if your VPN works well (the values will be similar to or even better than without the VPN). You will as well find out the quality of your connection in China (the values you obtain without a VPN). Description of the main encryption protocols Encryption protocols are an essential feature when it comes to choosing a VPN, as they determine its level of security and its ability to overcome the internet blocking in China and other countries. Below you can find the main encryption protocols:. PTTP: PTTP, with 128 bits, is the weakest encryption protocol, and because of this, is faster than the other protocols.
In addition to its speed, it has the advantage of being supported by the majority of devices. L2TP/IPSec: L2TP/IPsec is a 256-bit encryption protocol that is very robust but quite slow. Its main advantage is that this protocol can be used on the majority of mobile devices. OpenVPN: OpenVPN can be either 160 or 256 bits, and is a protocol which offers a very high level of security combined with a more than respectable speed.
The main problem it has is that it is often not supported by many mobile devices, in particular, iOS systems. Chameleon: Chameleon is a protocol very similar to OpenVPN 256 bits, offering a good speed with very robust encryption. It has the feature that it is specially designed so that the connection cannot be identified as a VPN, therefore avoiding it being blocked. SSTP: This is one of the fastest protocols, and can even be faster than PTTP.
In addition, it offers encryption which is almost as robust as LTP2/IPSec. However, this protocol is difficult to implement on the majority of systems, and is normally only compatible with Windows. Regarding China, currently, PTTP and SSTP don’t tend to work, and the protocol which tends to be most effective when it comes to getting around the firewall is OpenVPN. In addition to a good VPN, make sure that you have a decent Internet connection Different VPN don’t always behave the same: It’s common that depending on the place you’re connecting from, some VPN work better than others. For example ExpressVPN might work better from your workplace internet connection, whereas VyprVPN might work better from home. Nonetheless, as a general rule, ExpressVPN tends to have the least problems connecting, even on low-quality connections. As for VyprVPN, even though it tends to run into quite a few problems when on low-quality networks, if you have a relatively good connection and use the “connect to the fastest server” option, its services are normally very good, and at times even better than those of ExpressVPN.
With regards to NordVPN, although we have only been testing it for a short time when connections are poor, it has some problems upon connecting, but with good connections its performance is quite acceptable. Last of all, based on the short time that we have been using VPN Area, it seems to have very good and stable performance on the majority of connections, but configuring it properly and getting it to work can be tedious. What is IP leaking and how can it affect me?
When you use a VPN, in theory, your IP address is masked and external observers and the websites you visit can’t determine your real IP address. To put it simply, IP leaking is when your real IP address is discovered by the webpage you are visiting (normally through the execution of a script) despite you using a VPN. This causes you to lose your anonymity and your geolocation may be detected. In addition to the anonymity problems that this may pose, IP leaking can make a VPN useless for accessing geographically restricted websites. IP leaking can be a problem if you want to access geographically-restricted content.
A good VPN will reduce the likelihood of this happening While there are many ways of avoiding IP leaking, some of them are quite complicated for people who aren’t experts on the subject. Even so, there are simple measures that can substantially reduce the likelihood of this happening. Obviously, the better your VPN, the lower the likelihood of IP leaking.
The other precaution has to do with choosing your browser. Studies carried out on multiple browsers show that without a doubt, Microsoft Edge is the worst of them all and in this sense, Safari is the most secure. Opera and Google Chrome are similar and despite being better than Edge, are quite insecure.
Mozilla Firefox is quite secure without reaching the same level as Safari. Some tips to optimize your VPN Important: Sometimes, VPN can be detected as malware for your operating system (especially VyprVPN). If you want to use the VPN, you need to give it permission so that your firewall doesn’t block it.
Before giving this permission to the VPN, it’s important that you make sure that the VPN is from a trustworthy company (such as the ones that we recommend in this article, as some VPN can be dangerous for your laptop or smartphone. What package should I buy? If you are going to be in China for a long time, I recommend that you choose annual packages, as they tend to be a lot cheaper, and with the guaranteed money-back offered by these 4 VPN, if they don’t work well, you can always switch to another VPN.
How to avoid unwanted recurring payments It’s a common practice among VPN providers to renew your subscription automatically (included the four VPN we recommend). This means that after one month (or one year), they will charge you for another month (or another year, according to the subscribtion you purchased). How to avoid that?
Most VPN will automatically renew your subscription unless you indicate otherwise. Remember to cancel de souscription if you don’t need the VPN anymore. ExpressVPN: ExpressVPN allows you to turn off the auto-renewal by logging in to your account. VyprVPN: To avoid the recurring payment with VyprVPN you should cancel the subscription by accessing to the Control Panel. You should do it before the actual billing period ends. NordVPN: To opt out of recurring payments, go to “My Account” and click on “Payments,” where at the end you will see the “Cancel Subscription” option. Select the reason for your cancellation and click the “Continue” button.
Then, click “Continue” once again, finishing by clicking on “Cancel My Subscription” to verify the cancellation of recurring charges. VPN Area: For the time being, VPN Area does not have automated recurring payments, so when your subscription (for 1, 6 or 12 months) is about to expire, you will receive an email notice, and if you don’t renew it, the VPN will stop working. Note that if you subscribe using Paypal you can also disallow recurring payments directly from your Paypal account. In the case you forgot to deactivate the auto renewal and the company already charged you for the next billing period, in many cases you can still ask the money back. ExpressVPN gives you 30 days to ask for a refund (however it’s not clear if it also applies to the auto-renewal), VyprVPN and NordVVPN doesn’t specify if you can get a refund.
How do I optimize my connection? ExpressVPN Open ExpressVPN software and click on Run a Speed Test. Then, click Run Tests (the blue button on the top right-hand side) and wait until the test finishes (about 5 minutes).
At this point, select the server that appears first in the list (the fastest). It’s as simple as that!
As a general rule, choose servers located in countries nearby for better VPN performance VyprVPN Open VyprVPN software and click on the Location icon. Then click on Show servers – Chronometer – Ping test. At this point you should select the server that shows the smallest number (this represents the time necessary for the info to travel from your laptop to the server). NordVPN To make the most of NordVPN in China, when opening the application, go to Settings– - Show advanced settings.
Click I know what I’m doing and scroll through the options until you find see Obfuscated servers and activate it. By doing this, to the map will show obfuscated servers. According to the people at NordVPN, the server with the best performance is Japan 20-22, but in our experience, the one that has given the best results is the Singapore obfuscated server VPN Area VPN Area works quite well but it is usually a bit difficult to optimize for China. Although it is possible that sometimes you need to use the obfuscated servers , you can usually connect simply by doing the following: Open the VPN Area application - Show Dashboard - Servers / Speed → Select a server → Switch to TCP in Protocol and 53 in Port. It may also be necessary to activate the “Anti-DNS Leak” and the “Extra DNS protection”. Is it illegal to use a VPN in China? We aren’t lawyers and we are certainly not qualified to provide any legal advice.
So what follows is just our personal opinion: As far as we know, using a VPN in China isn’t illegal. Even so, there are a lot of contradictory rumors and news on the subject, which means that currently, it’s difficult to say which VPN can be used legally and which can’t.
Even if it’s true that VPN get often blocked, in another hand VPN are a necessary tool to improve security at companies, and because of this, it would make little sense to declare all VPN to be illegal. However, in January 2017 the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. The seems to only refer to VPN providers that operate from within China. It’s not clear yet how (and if) this will also affects VPN providers that operate from outside China (like the ones we recommend).
As of July 2017, the apps of the main VPN have been removed from Apple’s App Store in China. While this doesn’t stop you from using them (you can download them outside of China or configure the VPN manually), this indicates that multinational corporations are taking what’s happening seriously and are trying to adapt. In any event, you should keep in mind that when using a VPN, it doesn’t necessarily have to be illegal: it depends on the situation, and what you do with the VPN can be illegal or not. For example, if someone uses a VPN (to avoid being identified) to scam people, it’s obvious that this activity is illegal and will therefore be prosecuted. One last warning: When you use a VPN, it’s as if you were connecting from the country where the server is located (normally the United States). Because of that, intellectual property laws can be a lot stricter than what you’re used to in China, where regulations are much more lax in this sense. Therefore, do so at your own risk., and What websites are blocked in China?.
Generally speaking, the most popular social networks (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Flickr, etc), blogging platforms (WordPress.com, Blogspot, etc), Google services (Google.com, Gmail, Google+, Google Hangouts Google Docs, etc), messaging applications (WhatsApp, Line) and media websites that may be or have been critical towards China (The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg and LeMonde, just to provide some examples) are blocked. Most popular internet services in the West are blocked in China Then, there are websites or softwares that aren’t blocked but are so slow that they become practically useless. The most common example is probably Skype, which works on and off (for calls, messages usually work fine). Generally speaking, most of the websites that aren’t hosted in a Chinese server will be slow, when you try to connect from within China. This is especially true after 8 PM (Chinese time), as this corresponds to both American and European working times. This implies that the traffic in and out the Chinese network will be larger, and tends to saturate fairly often.
The best way to overcome this problem is, of course, to choose a VPN that is working well in China! Current state of the different VPN As we’ve mentioned before, evaluating which VPN is the best for China is complicated because it depends on many factors. A good VPN in one city or for a particular connection may have worse performance than in other circumstances. During times when internet restrictions are intensified (for example, party meetings, or at the beginning of Chinese New Year), some VPN hold up better than others.
Thanks to our personal experience and the multiple comments from our readers, we can currently say that in general, ExpressVPN tends to offer the best services in terms of speed, stability and the best resistance to times of restriction. In January 2018, its services were affected quite a bit, but it looks like it has been progressively improving. Now, in March 2018, ExpressVPN has turned out to be the most reliable, whereas other VPN have had a lot of connectivity problems. In April 2018 (after the completion of the 14 months of “cleaning up” the Internet), it seems like the situation has gone back to normal, and the majority of VPN are no longer experiencing too many problems.
Configuring a VPN on your router can have big advantages for security and lets you connect all of your devices at the same time, but is impractical if you want to change the VPN’s configurations Types of VPN Routers Depending on how the VPN on the router is configured, VPN routers are divided into three types. Physical: There currently exist various VPN providers who offer routers with the VPN already installed on them, making it extremely simple to configure the VPN Router. Some of the most famous VPN brands which offer this type of device are and. Application: Other VPN offer downloadable software that you later install on your router, making you able to control the VPN from your laptop.
This is similar to the last type of VPN router, and the only difference between them is that instead of buying a router with pre-installed software, you install the software yourself on the router you already have. This is obviously a little bit more complicated than the last option, but is within the ability of everyone. The main problem with this type is that not all routers are compatible with this type of software. Manual: Some routers allow you to configure a VPN manually. You will have to log in to the router and change its configuration so that it channels your internet connection over your VPN. However, this is not the ideal option, as although VPN providers provide step-by-step guides for each router model, it can be difficult for people who are not experts, and it is somewhat difficult to change the VPN configuration. VPN Router for ExpressVPN Currently, ExpressVPN is offering the possibility of (that is a router with a pre-installed VPN).
You can also choose to configure your router manually. The routers compatible with ExpressVPN are the following: Asus, DD-WRT, D-Link, FlashRouters, Linksys, Netduma, Netgear, Sabai, Tomato, TP-LINK VPN Router for VyprVPN Although VyprVPN does not offer routers with pre-installed software, it does offer an application so that you can install it on your router. To do you, before anything else, you are going to have to install the Tomato firmware on your router and then the VyprVPN app. VPN Router for NordVPN Just like ExpressVPN, NordVPN also has and can also be configured manually.
Some of the permitted routers are the following: Asus, TP-Link, D-Link, Linksys, Mikrotik, OpenWRT and pfSense. VPN Router for VPNArea VPN Area also has, and can also be configured manually on DD-WRT and Tomato routers., and Photo Credits First Photo :. Guys, you should check smaller VPNs too. Some of your picks did not work for me and some worked like a slow slow slooow torture. I’m using Surfshark VPN right now and I dunno if it’s because it’s less known or maybe less China users have tried it but I have absolutely no issues. There’re no specific settings to pick or servers that you have to connect to so it’s less hassle and no servers seems to be blocked so far.
I just hope that they will add more countries as options around the region some time soon.
Closed as off-topic by, Sep 29 '17 at 3:20 This question appears to be off-topic. The users who voted to close gave this specific reason:. 'Questions seeking product, service, or learning material recommendations are off-topic because they become outdated quickly and attract opinion-based answers. Instead, describe your situation and the specific problem you're trying to solve. Share your research.
On how to properly ask this type of question.' – Pimp Juice IT, music2myear If this question can be reworded to fit the rules in the, please. Following general methods are worth to try:. Try to use HTTPS instead of HTTP which is: instead of, sometimes company forgetting to filter HTTPS sites.
How To Access Facebook In Vietnam For Mac Free
SSL VPNs will do this automatically without messing up settings (e.g. Which is SSL based OpenVPN, or try ). Try substituting the IP address for a domain name; e.g., enter instead of google.com in a browser's address bar. Nslookup from the command line can easily allow you to issue DNS requests.
If you have SSH access to a server outside the the restricted network, you could open an SSH tunnel to that server on a local port and use it as a proxy in your browser. Create SSH tunnel: ssh -D 12345 user@ipordomainofyourserver.com Tell your browser to use localhost and port 12345 as SOCKS proxy. This solution requires SSH access to another server and the port (usually 22) on which your SSH server runs has to be open in your restricted network. You can also run SSH server on any other port. However, your connection will be fully encrypted and the admins of your network will not be able to see any data or even which hosts yo connect to. All they see is encrypted data and the IP of your remote server. Since your profile says you are in London I am going to assume that it's the network where you work that has blocked these services.
Since you would be breaking company policy, you might lose your job, just be aware of that. I have gotten around some restrictions where I work by using a different top-domain, for example using google.se instead of google.com and the likes. It will work sometimes, not all the time.
For email and online dating sites I usually use my phone, it's completely separate from the company network and outside of their control. However for gmail, what you could do is to find a web based e-mail provider that isn't blocked (perhaps easier said than done) and then use imap to connect to your email account. It's not an ideal workaround, but still a phone with an email client is still probably your best solution.
And depending on where you are in the city, perhaps there is an wifi-hotspot in your vicinity and can use that with your phone. Some of my ideas:. type in Google:, you'll find some websites using Circumventor software which can be used to get around Web blocking software. use service to share the screen with other PC with non-filtered internet access (if it's not blocked),. for GMail, try the following alternative address (with Gmail widget added): Also look in Google for other similar Google Partner Pages with GMail access ('), in that case they have to block the whole google domain to get rid all of them. Also you can set up independent mail widgets on Yahoo!
(like gmail, etc.).