Why was my laptop banned from accessing this site?? Is it because of a VPN for work? I haven’t had issues before.

I’m now on my phone.

 

Maybe it's something your work did. Has it happened on other sites from work?

 

I think it's the VPN. When I have my VPN on, which is most of the time , I can't get in or is very slow. Then if I turn it off, I can get in instantly. So I am very sure it's the VPN.

 

Its the VPN. Mine intermittently gets banned from the site on my VPN, its not consistent

 

We just don't like you

 

At the risk of being branded a 'nerd', it depends on where the 'gateway' is set for your machines IP address. Often, when on VPN, the provider will route your internet traffic away from your local connection and through their firewall, so as to protect the system you are connected to at the other end of that 'private network'. So, all internet traffic would flow THROUGH the VPN.

Once you disconnect, your primary connection would be restored to the 'gateway' of your internet provider, and would be much faster and avoid a potential block (or monitoring) by the VPN provider.

You can try a site like SPEEDTEST.NET to measure your internet access speed, on and off VPN; and in particular it will tell you where you are connecting from when you try. If that changes, then the gateway is the issue.

You can ask your company to change your VPN to allow internet to flow locally for you but I bet they won't allow it for security reasons.

 

Pardon my ignorance, but what is "VPN"?

 

VPN=Virtual Private Network, a way for a remote computer to securely join a network (typically a home PC connecting to a work network.)