HAL wireless and VPN

[TriumphGuy]

Hi, can anyone tell me if HAL allows the use of a VPN on their wireless network? I always try to use a VPN when I travel.

[CruiserBruce]

Many people report that VPNs don't work on the ship's internet. Didn't for us.

[YourWorldWithBill]

That's really interesting. I'm curious about the problem. That is, a VPN should just connect through whatever internet connection someone is using. I wonder if the problem might be that the connection on the ships just isn't strong enough, as everyone has issues connecting.

[2LoveBikes]

I believe VPNs are blocked by cruiselines.

[YourWorldWithBill]

3 minutes ago, 2LoveBikes said:

I believe VPNs are blocked by cruiselines.

Why is that not surprising? I was looking forward to watching football next Thanksgiving when I'm on a cruise, using my VPN. 

[REOVA]

Wonder if they will change VPN policy when all ships connect to Starlink? 

[TriumphGuy]

I would think they'd be able to block streaming services regardless of whether a VPN is used or not. I'd like to be able to use a VPN to keep tabs on investments and bank accounts. Nothing nefarious.

[clueless2]

2 hours ago, TriumphGuy said:

I would think they'd be able to block streaming services regardless of whether a VPN is used or not. I'd like to be able to use a VPN to keep tabs on investments and bank accounts. Nothing nefarious.

Financial sites all use TLS so your communications between your browser and the institution's web server is encrypted anyway.  I guess it's possible there are financial sites that don't use TLS.  I'd find another "bank" if it didn't.

[AFNavigator]

3 hours ago, YourWorldWithBill said:

Why is that not surprising? I was looking forward to watching football next Thanksgiving when I'm on a cruise, using my VPN. 

There likely will be some football on the TV system on Thanksgiving, primarily NFL games.  That's not much help if you are looking for college football though.

[YourWorldWithBill]

11 minutes ago, AFNavigator said:

There likely will be some football on the TV system on Thanksgiving, primarily NFL games.  That's not much help if you are looking for college football though.

Thanks. Looking for the NFL games. Although my next trip is HAL and this thread was about their VPN, my Thanksgiving cruise is Oceania.

[TriumphGuy]

1 hour ago, clueless2 said:

Financial sites all use TLS so your communications between your browser and the institution's web server is encrypted anyway.  I guess it's possible there are financial sites that don't use TLS.  I'd find another "bank" if it didn't.

Yeah, but another layer of security doesn't hurt.

[htera]

I was on the Oosterdam in January and can confirm that (for this ship) the VPN was not working; the connection would time out trying to connect to the VPN server.

I was in 2 different hotels immediately before and after the cruise. In both cases, using the exact same hardware, the connection would work fine.

[YourWorldWithBill]

I wonder if it would make a difference if somebody chose a VPN server

location in the country where the ship was docked.

Edited April 27, 2023 by YourWorldWithBill
Change one word.

[Ipeeinthepools]

On a related note, has anyone had any luck getting their cellphone's wireless calling feature to work with the HAL internet system?  We have never had a problem with the wifi calling feature to work on other cruise lines but we were not successful on our recent cruise on the Rotterdam.

[VMax1700]

3 hours ago, Ipeeinthepools said:

On a related note, has anyone had any luck getting their cellphone's wireless calling feature to work with the HAL internet system?  We have never had a problem with the wifi calling feature to work on other cruise lines but we were not successful on our recent cruise on the Rotterdam.

I found that wifi calling will only work with the premium package.

[YourWorldWithBill]

My memory might be fuzzy, but if I remember correctly, after changing one setting on the phone, our Wi-Fi calling was okay. Don't trust this as evidence.🤨

[Ipeeinthepools]

2 hours ago, YourWorldWithBill said:

My memory might be fuzzy, but if I remember correctly, after changing one setting on the phone, our Wi-Fi calling was okay. Don't trust this as evidence.🤨

 

Thanks, I had the premium package and still wasn't successful.  Let me know if you remeber the setting that you changed.

[YourWorldWithBill]

2 hours ago, Ipeeinthepools said:

 

Thanks, I had the premium package and still wasn't successful.  Let me know if you remeber the setting that you changed.

Nah, I remembered that I think that when I put the phone on airplane mode wi-fi calling turns off, but I can turn it back on. That wouldn't explain this issue, however, as I'm sure everyone does that.

[Haljo1935]

VPN has not worked for me on any HAL ship. As I cannot access work sites or send/receive work emails that have attachments, I am not able to work onboard HAL ships.

[The-Inside-Cabin]

VPN's are not blocked on HAL ships - they may not be able to connect with a weak internet connection, but they are not blocked by policy.  I have used VPN's many times on HAL ships.   

[Walfam]

We were unable to use our Nord VPN while on the Zuiderdam on a Panama Canal cruise in 2019.  I don't know why, but we crossed our fingers and used the ship's WiFi without that extra layer of protection.

[YourWorldWithBill]

11 hours ago, The-Inside-Cabin said:

VPN's are not blocked on HAL ships - they may not be able to connect with a weak internet connection, but they are not blocked by policy.  I have used VPN's many times on HAL ships.   

Thanks for this note, as that makes sense to me. I don't see how they could block a VPN, and assumed it was from the weak connections.

[IPB4IGO]

Last year we took four HAL cruises. On one or more my VPN worked. On others it did not.

 

We had the Premium Internet package on all four cruises, and Wi-Fi calling worked except on occasions when Internet speed was just too slow. That happened occasionally on every cruise.

[TriumphGuy]

8 minutes ago, IPB4IGO said:

Last year we took four HAL cruises. On one or more my VPN worked. On others it did not.

 

We had the Premium Internet package on all four cruises, and Wi-Fi calling worked except on occasions when Internet speed was just too slow. That happened occasionally on every cruise.

Aha! That may be the key! Perhaps one has to have the Premium internet package for VPN to work, as well as wifi calling. 
For those who were able to get VPN to work, what package did you have?

[Ipeeinthepools]

23 minutes ago, IPB4IGO said:

Last year we took four HAL cruises. On one or more my VPN worked. On others it did not.

 

We had the Premium Internet package on all four cruises, and Wi-Fi calling worked except on occasions when Internet speed was just too slow. That happened occasionally on every cruise.

 

12 minutes ago, TriumphGuy said:

Aha! That may be the key! Perhaps one has to have the Premium internet package for VPN to work, as well as wifi calling. 
For those who were able to get VPN to work, what package did you have?

 

Thanks, we had the premium internet on our cruise on the Amsterdam in February and the wifi calling only seemed to work one time and I forget if we were in port.  Hopefully it will be better this summer in Europe on the Amsterdam.