I wonder if it's related to this workaround that allowed access to some Google IPs to bypass the captive portal, which someone managed to then use to access app engine, and a proxy running there to reach the entire internet: http://bryceboe.com/2012/03/12/bypassing-gogos-inflight-inte...

quote from that article:

"There is, of course, one other possible solution: Gogo could man-in-the-middle the desired Google web services in order to perform filtering on the HTTP host header. However, this approach could have unforeseen consequences. Therefore, I do not recommend it."