The 2022 FIFA World Cup is kicking off in style and the whole world is waiting to cheer on their favorite country. There’s plenty of talent running onto the pitch this year too, with the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi, and Kylian Mbappe hoping to be the heroes for their respective countries.
The competition is stiff this year, and it’s impossible to predict who’s going to take the trophy home. But, if one thing is certain, it’s that you don’t want to miss out on any of the action at this year’s World Cup! Every single match is going to be a thriller, and you want to make sure that you have access to some of the most reliable and best-quality live streams on the web.
Getting access to some of the best 2022 World Cup live streams is never an easy task though. Internet users who frequently visit sports live streaming sites, and even other entertainment platforms like YouTube and Netflix will be all too familiar with those frustrating geo-blocking restrictions that stop you from enjoying video content online. Luckily though, there’s an easy way to get past these restrictions with a handy cybersecurity tool known as a virtual private network. Let’s get into how it all works!
The Best World Cup Live Streams
We’ve all heard of ESPN and Sky Sports, some of the most famous sports live-streaming platforms in the world. These media companies need to pay millions of dollars to secure the streaming rights for the World Cup this year.
Along with the streaming rights also come a strict set of rules that these media companies need to follow. One of these rules will prevent media companies from streaming their content outside of their specified region or country.
Streaming websites uses your Ip to pinpoint your location. An Ip is only a unique string of figures which is used to recognize your device on the web. If your IP address tells the website that you’re accessing the website from outside of their licensed region, you’ll be blocked from accessing the live stream. This is better known as geographical blocking or geo-blocking for short.
Let’s put geo-blocking into a real-world scenario. For instance, you’re in Germany and you want to tune into the Sky Sports live stream to enjoy your favorite teams going head to head for the World Cup. You will be blocked from watching the live stream, being met by an error message instead. You’ll encounter geo-blocking even if you’re a paying Sky Sports customer. Frustrating right? Well, here’s the fix!
Make Sure to Use a VPN
You just need an opportune cybersecurity tool placed on your device. The tool in question is known as a virtual private network, but it’s more often referred to as a VPN.
The primary reason for a Virtual private network would be to secure your online connection that will prevent other people from seeing what you’re doing in your device while surfing the net. It will also prevent anyone from snooping through your data! VPNs are so powerful that they will even prevent your internet service provider, the government, and skilled cybercriminals from tracking your internet history or monitoring your internet traffic.
But that’s not what we’re after with a VPN. VPNs permit you to connect with secure global servers far away and metropolitan areas all over the world. When you connect to one of these servers, your real IP address will be hidden from any websites that you visit. Your device will also adopt the IP address of the server that you have connected to.
In doing so, you will trick the website into thinking that you’re accessing it from elsewhere. Spoofing your location in this way will allow you to bypass geo-blocking restrictions.
If we revisit our previous example of watching Sky Sports, we can see how a VPN works in action. To access Sky sports from outside of the UK, you simply need to fire up your VPN and hook it up to a server in the UK. Your IP address will change to one in the UK, and the website will allow you to watch the live stream as if you were in the UK.
Choosing the Right VPN
It’s important to choose the right VPN, especially when it comes to live streaming. The golden rule that you always need to follow is that you must use a premium VPN at all times. It might be tempting to use one of the many free VPNs available on the internet, but ultimately it’s not worth it. If you’re using a free VPN you will run into problems like slower connection speeds, more ads, less security, daily data limits, and fewer global servers to choose from. All of these factors will affect your ability to live stream World Cup matches, but you won’t encounter any of these issues if you’re using a premium VPN!
