So, we’ve firmly established that YouTube is going after ad blockers in an effort to push its users to pay for YouTube Premium, but some users has found workarounds as a paying user by routing through VPN to pay for subscriptions that are significantly cheaper in certain regions. The company has took notice, and has begin to crackdown on this as well.
Pay The Full Price For YouTube Premium, Or Else
Reddit user Alopez1024 has posted a screenshot of an email from YouTube informing cancellation of Premium subscription, and the consensus under the post has confirmed that this originates from the company’s crackdown efforts.
A unique phenomenon in YouTube Premium’s pricing structure meant that each region may gets completely different pricing despite paying for the same exact services regardless of where you are – you get the same ad-free experience, offline downloads, background playback, high-bitrate 1080p streams, and full access to ad-free YouTube Music.
Naturally, this has caused some users to use VPN to access a region where Premium is cheaper, and return back to the original region once the purchase has been completed. (For reference, Premium costs RM17.90 here in Malaysia, but the pricing in the US is $14 – or roughly RM66 per month.)
In a statement provided to TechCrunch, YouTube confirms that it is capable of detecting users who purchase YouTube Premium outside of their native regions. “To provide the most accurate plans and offers available, we have systems in place to determine the country of our users. In instances where the signup country does not match where the user is accessing YouTube, we’re asking members to update their billing information to their current country of residence.”
As a countermeasure, the video sharing platform has since cancelled offending users’ active subscriptions, Google told PCMag. “YouTube has initiated the cancellation of premium memberships for accounts identified as having falsified signup country information. Due to violating YouTube’s Paid Terms of Service, these users will receive an email and an in-app notification informing them of the cancellation.” The Google representative said the actions was taken recently, but declined to specify the exact date.
Of course, this sucks for those who wanted to save a buck while still enjoying the feature YouTube Premium offers – if Netflix’s password-sharing crackdown is any indication, any attempts made at sharing passwords under a family plan for Premium, should the price-conscious users choose to adapt, may eventually see the same fate as well.
Pokdepinion: This certainly leaves a sour taste for countries with high monthly pricing.
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