HTTP PR0XY
A proxy is a point to point connection between your computer and a remote location on the Internet. There are different types of proxies such as HTTP, transparent, anonymous, elite, ssl, socks, vpn. I will be writing about HTTP proxies this time.
A proxy server is used to access Web pages by other computers. A computer requests a web page, the proxy grabs it and sends it to the requesting computer. The web server hosting the web site never comes into contact with your computers network that grabs it from the proxy server.
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A good example of why someone would use a proxy is to access region-restricted content. When the Jerks at Hulu decided to restrict access to everyone except to the people in the U.S. You have the option to say "Screw you guys!" I'm going to use a U.S. based proxy server and watch Hulu's garbage media anyway.
You can chain proxy servers together for more added fun. Proxies act
kind of like a filter for malware and can also hide your ip address.
The bad thing about using a proxy is you don't know who you're connecting to. Anyone running a proxy server can use a sniffer on it and when you go to login to your e-mail or whatever else, they can get your login and passwords. I wouldn't suggest you use free public proxies for logging in anywhere for this reason.
I have a separate browser just for using a proxy on it. I can use the
proxified browser and the no proxy browser at the same time. That makes
me special! If you want to get into the proxy fun I have links for you
to send you on your way.
