What each party in the chain sees
Your phone or laptop sends everything through the app, so the lookups for site names leave the device inside the tunnel, not as separate plain requests.
The carrier carries the packets and still sees who you are on its network, when the connection is up, how much data moves and the address it ends at.
The server abroad decrypts the traffic and passes it on, so it is the place that sees destinations. The service keeps no logs, and the servers are outside Vietnam: none are in the country.
The sites you open see the address of that server, never your carrier's address, and never a Vietnamese one.
The step before the tunnel: Telegram
The link comes from a Telegram bot, so the bot has to open on your line first. On 21 May 2025 a letter from the telecommunications department, number 2312/CVT-CS, told carriers to block Telegram and report back by 2 June 2025 (Digital Policy Alert). OONI recorded the block from 25 May 2025 to 10 July 2025 on three networks: FPT (AS18403), VNPT (AS45899) and Viettel (AS7552) (OONI). The networks did not behave alike, and the table shows what the sources say about each.
Telegram on each carrier in 2025
| Carrier | Network | What was recorded | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Viettel | AS7552 | Blocked from 25 May to 10 July 2025; neither the app nor the web version opened | OONI |
| VNPT | AS45899 | Same dates; neither the app nor the web version opened | OONI |
| FPT | AS18403 | Same dates; the app failed, the web version opened | OONI |
| MobiFone | not named | No separate measurement in the sources used for this page | None found |
| VinaPhone | not named | No separate measurement in the sources used for this page | None found |
The 2025 Telegram block in four dates
- 21 May 2025Letter 2312/CVT-CS orders carriers to block Telegram
- 25 May 2025OONI sees the block on FPT, VNPT and Viettel
- 2 June 2025Deadline for carriers to report back
- 10 July 2025Block recorded as lifted, Wi-Fi first and mobile after
What follows for a reader on one of these lines
Nothing about the block was permanent, and 2026 measurements look calm: OONI's monthly Telegram anomaly counts for Vietnam run from 3 of 1,579 in May to 22 of 2,063 in June, which is under 1.1 per cent in every month from January to October, and none was confirmed as a block (OONI). An anomaly is a result that differs from expectation and is not proof of a block, so this is a reason to test the bot on your own line, not a promise about it. If Telegram does not open on a line, this service cannot help there, and this page does not describe a way around that.
The order also shows how the system is built. An order reaches the carriers by letter and each network applies it in its own way, so the effect varies by network and can change between Wi-Fi and mobile data. The agency behind it changed names too: the old communications ministry was dissolved on 18 February 2025 and its work moved to the Ministry of Science and Technology from 1 March 2025 (VietnamNet), which is why reports from May 2025 name the ministry differently.
Where this explanation ends
Four things stay outside it. How any carrier treats a tunnelled connection, whether it slows it, exempts it from a plan or ignores it, is set in the carrier's own terms and is not in the sources used here. The method used on MobiFone and VinaPhone was not found separately, so none is claimed. Speed to a server abroad depends on the line and the hour, and no speed table is published here. And whether a VPN is allowed, and for what, is a legal matter that differs by country and changes: you answer for local law and for following the terms of each service you use.
The section this page opens goes further: what a Vietnamese address would need, the legal rules in 2026, one page for each server country, and two line-specific pages, one for FPT and one for VinaPhone and MobiFone data.