Exclusive: US plans online portal to bypass content bans in Europe and elsewhere

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Reuters

February 18, 2026 3:56 PM EST Updated 8 hours ago


WASHINGTON, Feb 18 (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department is developing an online portal that will enable people in Europe and elsewhere to see content banned by their governments including alleged hate speech and terrorist propaganda, a move Washington views as a way to counter censorship, three sources familiar with the plan said.

The site will be hosted at "freedom.gov," the sources said. One source said officials had discussed including a virtual private network function to make a user's traffic appear to originate in the U.S. and added that user activity on the site will not be tracked.

Headed by Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers, the project was expected to be unveiled at last week's Munich Security Conference but was delayed, the sources said. Reuters could not determine why the launch did not happen, but some State Department officials, including lawyers, have raised concerns about the plan, two of the sources said, without detailing the concerns.

The project could further strain ties between the Trump administration and traditional U.S. allies in Europe, already heightened by disputes over trade, Russia’s war in Ukraine and President Donald Trump’s push to assert control over Greenland. The portal could also put Washington in the unfamiliar position of appearing to encourage citizens to flout local laws.

Read more: https://www.reuters.com/world/us-plans-online-portal-bypass-content-bans-europe-elsewhere-2026-02-18/

[Cheezoholic]

1. This is about Facefook et al, nothing else. Its no different than countries buying sanctioned materials

There is 0 difference between this and someone buying sanctioned Russian (or now Venezuelan) oil. None, zero. Its a hostile economic geopolitical attack and should be called what it is.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. OK, can someone in the US test this for me, please?

The US government homepage for the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration - https://www.samhsa.gov - give me, un the UK, a "403 Forbidden" reply. I can't tell if they've disabled it just for people outside the USA (which would be the censorship they claim to hate, done by the US government), or if they've just neglected the site for everyone, since they don't care about such things any more.

archive.org has been getting errors for about a month - here's their record:

https://web.archive.org/web/20260000000000*/https://www.samhsa.gov/

One of the last ones that worked for them was:

https://web.archive.org/web/20260116032408/https://www.samhsa.gov/

Can anyone here access the plain https://www.samhsa.gov page? That's what Google gives me as their home page.

[msongs]

3. https://www.samhsa.gov page opens fine for me....lovely pic of RFK jr among others

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. OK, thanks - looks like they are censoring it for overseas use, then

which shows the hypocrisy that is characteristic of them.

I wonder why archive.org gets so many errors (a similar problem, for an overseas user, that many US news sites cause, is that the European regulations about storing personal data means that the cookies etc. used to serve advertising are too onerous for many companies - so, rather than follow them (as the major sites like CNN do), they just say "we don't display our web pages in Europe". That is the news site's decision, though, rather than the US government. And archive.org is a way round that, usually.)

[Igel]

9. My students got 403 errors today trying to access some sites that worked fine last year.

The district's security filters were updated to preclude student access. I could see things just fine when logged in as a teacher.

I've run into 403 errors on my home computer but my cell phone is granted immediate access.

My favorite is when Chrome gets a 403 error but Firefox doesn't.

Denial is usually server-side, but if something's funky on your end--bad credentials of some sort, for example--403 it is because you're not trusted. Sometimes it's just that server-side somebody's let expectations grow a bit stale so what's expected isn't the current "thing".

Clear your cache, check your malware security and ad blockers, and reboot. Then try. (And maybe the server should see a bit of maintenance.)

Even the Wayback Machine didn't just lose access--it was spotty for a while, then failed.

[rampartd]

5. what a spokesman for substance abuse!

[bucolic_frolic]

6. I clicked https://www.samhsa.gov and it loaded for me. /nt

[Layzeebeaver]

7. Internet domain blocking dude in Iran...

“Hold my beer…”.

╔══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
║ NATIONAL NETWORK HARMONY SUITE v9.4 (Patriot Edition) ║
╠══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╣
║ Target: freedom.gov ║
║ Scope : NATIONWIDE (all ISPs, all provinces, all vibes) ║
║ Mode : HARD BLOCK (DNS sink + SNI slap + router scowl) ║
║ Reason: "Excessive Freedom" ║
╚══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝

[1/6] Resolving domain… freedom.gov → 203.0.113.42 (probably) ✔
[2/6] Injecting DNS “helpfulness”… now points to 127.0.0.1 ✔
[3/6] Training DPI hamsters… they now recognize “freedom” ✔
[4/6] Deploying to edge boxes… 666 nodes updated ✔
[5/6] Performing loyalty ping… PASS (patriotism latency: 4ms) ✔
[6/6] Confirming denial… ACCESS: DENIED (with enthusiasm) ✔

NOTE: Citizens attempting circumvention will receive:
"Connection timed out (for your own comfort)."

[Emrys]

8. Maybe they can stop IMGURL blocking UK users from viewing all images and videos it hosts

If they're not going to be tracking traffic on the site, it'll be wide open to DoS attacks from individuals or state security services.