Anonymous Proxies Explained: An In-Depth Look
The last couple of years were tense for cybersecurity experts. The pandemic introduced global Work From Home practices demanding better home network security. Afterward, the war in Ukraine unleashed Russia's cybercrime gangs upon the West without persecution. One of the results is an increase in identity theft cases that exploit social crises to trick unsuspecting internet users into disclosing personal details to attackers.
Anonymous proxies are a highly recommended tool for online privacy protection. An anonymous proxy server takes over and handles online communication, including IP address obfuscation, anonymizing client request headers, and, sometimes, data encryption. However, as with all privacy tools, there are limits you should be aware of.
We recommend reading our dedicated anonymous proxy ultimate guide to understand general anonymous proxy features. In this one, we'll take an in-depth look into anonymous proxy cybersecurity and privacy features, use cases, and limits.
How Do Anonymous Proxies Work?
Imagine anonymous proxies as a middle-man between your device and the internet. In standard online browsing communication, your device (called client) makes requests via a web browser to websites (called servers). It uses your original IP address assigned by the internet service provider accompanied by an HTTP header that includes device-specific details, like a user-agent, language, authorization, and many other details.
This efficient data exchange method has some shortcomings, the need for more privacy features being one of them. The issue here is that an IP address can be used for online tracking and launching cyber attacks.
For example, a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) targets specific IP addresses with fake bot requests until it overloads the servers. It can shut down giant websites but can also target a personal device, like DDoSing, a video game streamer, to disconnect them from a match.
Anonymous proxies come in handy because they obfuscate the original user's IP address with their own. It becomes much more challenging to track the user's online activities on the original device, and even if the proxy server goes down, it's easy to reconnect to a different one to maintain internet access. Here's how anonymous proxy servers manage online data transfers:
1. Your browser makes a request, sending your original IP address, HTTP header, and other data packets to the target destination.
2. Instead of communicating directly, your device routes the data to the anonymous proxy server.
3. The anonymous proxy strips your IP address from the "X-forwarded-for" header and assigns its own.
4. The IP address is substituted using Network Address Translation technology. Websites (servers) now see the proxy IP instead of your own.
5. An anonymous proxy acts as a client and establishes communication with the server.
6. The server inspects the requests and responds with the required information.
7. The proxy server receives the data and forwards it back to the original client, which is your device.
Although the process looks straightforward enough, the underlying technology is sophisticated. Furthermore, proxy anonymity is further strengthened by sophisticated encryption algorithms, like HTTPS and SOCKS proxies use. Let's overview different anonymous proxies types.
Anonymous Proxies Types
You will get the best results if you choose an anonymous proxy service that offers the features you require. The availability of desired features depends on proxy types. It's best to avoid understanding them from a better-worse perspective but treat them as different services suited for different needs.
Elite Proxies
Anonymous proxies that ensure the best online privacy features are called Elite proxies. Not only do they modify headers to remove the original IP address, they also can hide the fact you are using a proxy in the first place. Some websites inspect incoming traffic, and if they identify a proxy or VPN user, they restrict access or block the IP address. We recommend taking a look at residential proxies that utilize genuine people's devices so identifying a proxy user becomes much more complicated. Some elite proxies also apply additional encryption, significantly contributing to online anonymity.
Transparent Proxies
In direct opposition to elite proxies, transparent proxies have the lowest online privacy features. Because they do reroute your traffic through a proxy server, they provide some anti-tracking protection. Such proxies usually do not offer encryption, do not modify HTTP headers, and may not even mask the original IP address. However, they fit perfectly for caching, content filtering, and load balancing to optimize data routes for a smoother online data exchange.
HTTP and HTTPS proxies
The Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure is a common online data exchange standard. HTTP and HTTPS proxies are specifically designed for web browsing, and they help to bypass geo-restrictions. They efficiently understand HTTP requests, and the HTTPS proxies also apply additional TLS (Transport Layer Security) encryption to protect user browsing activities from unwanted attention.
SOCKS proxies
SOCKS proxies are like HTTP and HTTPS cousins with expanded use cases. Unlike HTTP, this type of anonymous proxy servers works with numerous protocols (FTP, UDP, TCP, etc.) and focuses solely on data routing. That expands use cases to gaming traffic, p2p sessions, web scraping, and more. SOCKS proxies mask and substitute the original IP address, which can be configured to apply additional encryption. We recommend checking out SOCKS5 proxies, the latest and most feature-rich version.
Advanced Use Cases for Anonymous Proxies
The robust anonymous proxies' online privacy features are in high demand, considering the extensive contemporary online surveillance tools. Bear in mind that in the US, since 2017, internet service providers can collect and sell user data without consent, which is a farewell to online privacy without additional tools. Here are anonymous proxy use cases that heavily rely on online privacy features.
Journalism
Journalists who are critical of governments must use online anonymization tools to remain safe while doing their jobs. It's paramount to use an anonymous proxy that applies additional encryption to ensure surveillance agencies cannot use deep packet inspection and see the content. Furthermore, it's best to combine anonymous proxies with additional privacy protection tools, like a privacy-oriented web browser, user agent obfuscation, virtual machines, etc.
Unrestricted Internet Access
Whenever political turmoil intensifies, internet restrictions soon follow. Remember the arab spring that covered the downfall of several dictatorships in the Middle East? Almost immediately, power structures attempted to limit online content to prevent people from mobilizing or reading the news. HTTPS proxies can bypass geo-restrictions using additional encryption to maintain secure and unrestricted internet access.
Competitor Monitoring
Businesses are particularly secretive about disclosing details, even if they are public and available on their website. For example, they can limit web scraping requests for price comparison to make things harder for competitors. Anonymous proxies with IP address rotation fit perfectly well with web scrapers, which can be used to send multiple web scraping requests with different IPs. This way, they avoid detection bans and streamline business intelligence gathering.
How to Choose the Best Anonymous Proxy Provider
You will choose a suitable anonymous proxy provider if you accurately identify your needs. You may not need online privacy if you're looking to redistribute traffic between servers or cache files to minimize packet size. On the other hand, you will require an anonymous proxy service for most web scraping operations or avoiding censorship.
Firstly, you should verify privacy-related features. Do they apply additional TLS encryption, modify HTTP headers, and obfuscate an IP address? SOCKS5 proxies support username:password authentication so that you can restrict access to your server for other users. SOCKS also supports more protocols required to safeguard gaming sessions or email traffic. Some proxies also use proxy chains to bounce traffic through multiple servers to avoid detection.
A vast IP address pool is also essential. It lets you connect to worldwide servers to bypass geo-blocks and access locally-restricted online content. The best proxy service providers regularly expand the proxy pool with new high trust score IPs that will make your traffic nearly inseparable from a genuine user.
Lastly, confirm the speed, uptime, and customer support availability. The former is paramount for comfortable and uninterrupted browsing. Meanwhile, an excellent customer support team will promptly assist with any issues, especially those that are important to journalists and political activists.
Technical Setup and Optimization for Anonymous Proxies
You only need two things to set up anonymous proxies: a proxy IP address and a port number. Additionally, you may require a username and password credential if your chosen proxy uses authentication.
On Windows, go to the Settings in the Start menu and then to Network & Internet options. Locate the Proxy section there and turn on the Use a proxy server slide. Input the proxy IP address and Port number in the unlocked fields and save the details.
On macOS, launch the Apple menu and choose the Network option. Choose the network type and click on Advanced, then locate the Proxies section. Choose the proxy type you'll be using and input IP address and port number details.
Setting up proxies on mobile depends on the device you are using. Generally, proxy options are located in the Settings, then mobile network or Wi-Fi section. When you locate the proxy settings, choose to add a Manual proxy, then enter the IP address and port number.
Conclusion
Anonymous proxies are here to stay. Governments, Big Tech, and data mining agencies seek user data almost out in the open, and it's only increasing. Tools that anonymize traffic using proxy chains, additional encryption, and IP address obfuscation are essential to protect one's privacy. To conclude, sooner or later, you will run into anonymous proxies if you don't feel like sharing online activities with third parties.
