LESSON 1 - WHY A V.P.N. ?????

Welcome back to FIRE TV BY FRESH

Today we are going to address the elephant in the room. Is it illegal to hack (Jailbreak) a Fire Stick ???

The answer to the first question is simple. Jail breaking A Fire Stick isn’t rocket science!!! Any kid with a little technological know-how can easily jailbreak/hack/unlock Fire Stick. 

 But is having a jail broken Fire Stick illegal? The answer is NO. Jail breaking or hacking or unlocking your Amazon Fire TV Stick is definitely not illegal. It is purely legal simply because of the fact that it is your personal property. You can enjoy it the way you wish until and unless you’re not interfering with anyone else’s enjoyment of their property or infringing on any national statute.

So you can certainly jailbreak Fire Stick without getting into legal trouble. You can also install the KODI Application on a Fire Stick without breaking any laws. However, there’s a small catch. Once you have installed Kodi along with its add ons, you have opened up an ocean of free multimedia content on your hacked Amazon Fire TV Stick. You can access thousands of channels and videos which might not be available for free otherwise or might even be blocked in your region.

This is basically the catch. A Jail broken Fire Stick isn’t strictly illegal, but what you do next is very important. For instance, if you watch copyrighted content on Kodi, then you definitely might land in trouble. You can get in trouble either with your Government depending upon the Copyright laws of your country or with your ISP. Your ISP might issue a strike against your account for accessing pirated/ illegal content. It might even block or suspend your internet account. Remember last time I talked about how your ISP (Internet Service Provider) was able to track what you do? Well, they can. And that would not be a good thing.

Legal stuff HERE: Fire TV by Fresh does not condone nor recommend using a modified Fire Stick to watch copyrighted material. (OK, I'm covered)

However, you can very easily circumvent this problem. All you’ve to do is to use some Virtual Private Network (VPN). Now, once again let us tell you that while using VPN's may not be completely legal, but it’s strictly not illegal as well. You will be very much responsible for the content that you access using that VPN and might be held liable if anything is traced back to you. So, tread very cautiously at your own risk. You can use a VPN to either access content blocked in your geographical region or secure anonymity.

I strongly suggest getting a PAID VPN for your Fire stick instead of free options.

Remember you are going to SAVE a ton of money every month when you tell the Cable Company to “STICK IT.” And you only get what you pay for.

Another advantage of a VPN is : Let's say you came to the USA from the country of Freedonia.

And you would love to watch Freedonia TV. But it is NOT available outside of Freedonia. Simple fix. Just connect your VPN to a server in Freedonia and bingo bob !!! It looks like you are home again and you can watch Freedonia TV.

As you explore Fire Stick APPS, you will find a large number of TV suppliers that only works in some countries. 

Learning a new language?? Connect to a server in that country and have at it. It's fun and educational.

Now let's talk about what VPN to use.

For us, we went with the PAID IPN VANISH. 

With one account, you can protect up to 10 of your devices. I have it on my main computer as well as my three Fire Sticks and 2 iPADS.

Basically, what a VPN does is it hides your true IP address from the outside world.

Let's look at the computer we are using now. (And it works the same way on a fire stick.)

Here is the screen you get when you first start the program (Prior to connecting to a server)

It's hard to see, so let's zoom in on the upper left.

Notice the IP Address. This is my machine and my address. MY ISP knows where I am (Ocala FL) and my machine IP address. ( I blacked out the IP Address) So my ISP can track everything I stream.

Now let's click connect. I have the settings so it looks for the best server. Now for some reason this computer always connects to MIAMI, while my Fire TV connects to Atlanta.

 Again, let's check the upper left

  As you can see, NOW my ISP thinks I am in Miami with a totally different IP Address. (also blacked out) They no longer see my machine, as everything that leaves this machine is encrypted. They have NO IDEA where I am located or what I am looking at or downloading.

For our next lesson we are going to take a look at what you will need in order to enjoy this marvelous invention.

 We will do that next time on FIRE TV BY FRESH