A proxy is an intermediary link between the computer that the subscriber uses and the system of Internet servers. Without going into terminology, this is a remote computer intermediary for the user to access the Internet. Its main tasks are to broadcast all user requests to the Network and send back the received responses. We will tell you more about what a proxy is, how the server works and what purpose it is used for below.
How proxy connection works
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Each computer that connects to the network is assigned a unique IP address. Its task is to identify the Internet user. The IP address carries information about the country and region, the number of the Internet provider and the personal computer in its network. Proxy servers are also assigned unique IP addresses. After connecting to the proxy and sending requests to the Network, the check will show that they come from the intermediary server, and the subscriber himself will be able to keep his incognito (in the case of working with free servers, the paid information about the client is saved). You can buy a personal proxy here https://you-proxy.com/.
To connect to the proxy, you will need to configure the browser that will be used to send custom requests. All subsequent network connections will be made to the IP address of the proxy server. When you need to access any web resource, the local computer will open a connection to the proxy and make a request. After checking the correctness of the request, a connection to the resource will open. Then the received answer will be transmitted to the subscriber’s computer.
Why and who needs a proxy
Today, proxy servers are used primarily to hide the true IP address. There may be several reasons for this. The most popular ones are the desire to visit the site, access to which is blocked for your IP, and the need to send mail anonymously. There are several more reasons when you need a proxy:
- protection of a network or local computer from certain types of network attacks and the need to protect confidential information;
- restricting user access to certain types of web resources. It is practised in companies to prevent wasting time by employees;
- the desire to connect several computers to the Internet with the same IP address. Settings can be made in such a way that information about local
- machines will be hidden from external machines, they can only be seen by an intermediary;
- the need to save consumed traffic – the information received from the Web will be transmitted to the user in a compact form;
- the need to reduce the load on the Internet channel and provide customers with prompt access to information. For such cases, files are cached and then stored on a proxy server.
Proxies can be found on some sites where they are uploaded for free. The second option is to download using special software that allows you to use a filter by country and test the speed and operation of the proxy server. And one more way is to buy an “authorized” server on special sites.
Advantages
They gained the greatest popularity in the corporate segment – it is through them that access to the online network from the local networks of legal entities is carried out. This was facilitated by the following advantages:
- proxy servers are supported by the absolute majority of well-known web browsers;
- full access control, convenient traffic accounting, filtering (in cases of integration with antivirus software) is carried out;
- the ability to work with minimal rights on any operating system;
- the lack of access to the Internet using other protocols significantly increases the security of information exchange in the corporate network.
Despite the increasing popularity of certain network protocols, proxies continue to dominate enterprises. This is despite the emergence of relatively inexpensive hardware routers with NAT functionality. This is mainly due to the fact that the above routers are not able to provide sufficient control over Internet access and content filtering.
Types
Transparent – a communication scheme that redirects part of the traffic (or all) to the proxy server by the router. The advantage of this type of communication is the ability of the client to take full advantage of the proxy server without performing any settings. This is also a disadvantage, since it deprives the user of choice.
Reverse – A proxy server used to rebalance network load across multiple web servers. In addition, his task is to improve their safety. In this case, the reverse proxy server acts as a firewall at the application layer. When using it, user requests are relayed from the external network to one or more servers located in the internal network.
Besides the fact that proxies are divided into transparent and reverse types, they can be classified as follows:
- HTTP is the most popular and versatile type of proxy that can be used for a wide variety of tasks. Most modern software supports working with him;
- Socks is a type of proxy that not every program is compatible with. Requires the installation of additional software in browsers, since they do not support Socks by default;
- CGI – interaction with them is carried out only through the browser, other software does not support CGI. Another name for this type of proxy is anonymizer;
- FTP is a type of proxy often used in corporate networks as one of the components of a unified system for protecting equipment from external threats.
