It looks as though EA has suspended its digital distribution services in a whole country. The news comes from Reddit user trivial_sublime who posted on how the service seems to have been shut down for him and other users. In his post, trivial_sublime comments on how access to Origin has been revoked in Myanmar, Burma.
“I live in Myanmar, and I own about 20 games on Origin, and have spent hundreds of dollars on the platform. I’ve bought the full editions of all of the Battlefield games up to this point, with their season passes. I was trying to log into Origin a few days ago, and got a bizarre ‘Access Denied’ message. I googled it, and found that ‘Origin is no longer available in Myanmar.'”
Other users have posted about the denial of service in the country on EA’s official forums. A post made by DarkAmaranth1966 on the EA forums states that, “Yes, with the Origin 10 update, US laws (which is where EA is based) forced them to block certain countries. Unfortunately you live in one of those countries. I’m sorry but there is nothing we ca do here to allow you access again.”
Other users on the forum have noted that sanctions that were put in place against Burma were most likely the cause of the service being blocked, but those sanctions were recently withdrawn back by President Obama this month. trivial_sublime and other users report that they were still able to access Origin despite the sanctions and that this issue have recently occurred. Users has also confirmed that other digital services such as GOG and Steam are still operational in their area. The Reddit post then concludes his post by stating, “This is a much, MUCH bigger problem than just a few gamers in Myanmar. This highlights a crucial element of the TOS of big game companies – the money that you pay them gives you essentially nothing in return, except for an empty promise that the game company may let you play their game until they decide you can’t.”
Another Reddit post highlights that the service was blocked in Iran 2 weeks ago.