Picture this: You have a solid idea you’d love to present to the boss. However, your current position does not allow you easy access to the boss. You’d most likely need a month-long appointment to have the idea seen. So, what do you do?
You entrust a friend close to the boss to share the idea. And you allow them to claim the idea, getting you the much-desired feedback in as little as a week.
You see, this is the same principle a distorting proxy uses.
What is a Distorting Proxy?
A distorting proxy is an intermediary that claims your web requests by replacing your IP address with one of its fake IPs, getting you the desired responses. And, just like your friend’s position of advantage, a distorting proxy can fetch you geo-restricted content.
Let’s explore more of what you get from entrusting a distorting proxy with your web traffic. Moreover, stay tuned until the end, as we’ll also explore how a distorting proxy works.
What Advantages Does a Distorting Proxy Grant You?
1. Enhances privacy and online security
By replacing your IP address with a fake one, a distorting proxy conceals your location and identity. Remember, your IP address is like your home address. If exposed to third-party network entities, they can extract much information from your web traffic, including details that could be used to track your online activities.
2. Great for software testing
Do you own an application or website with location-specific features or services? You can use a distorting proxy to simulate different location users and test the application or website. A distorting proxy allows you to use different IP addresses to test and verify content delivery in various locations, ensuring consistent user experience across varied locations.
3. Enhances data mining and web scraping operations
Choosing a suitable distorting proxy for web scraping and data mining can take your operations to the next level. Why? A high-performing and reliable distorting proxy can distribute data mining or scraping requests across multiple fictitious IP addresses, reducing the chances of IP blocks. Moreover, the distorting proxy can get you geo-restricted data.
4. You can gain access to region-blocked games
Certain gaming companies do restrict players from accessing various games. Sometimes, the companies may block the IP addresses of specific gamers. If you fall under either of these categories, note that a distorting proxy can help you bypass the restrictions or IP bans. Here is how a distorting proxy does it!
How a Distorting Proxy Works
As highlighted, a distorting proxy replaces your original IP address with a fake one. The IP can be a residential, ISP, or mobile IP address. This means all the requests you route through a distorting proxy never reveal your identity or location. Let’s delve deeper into how this happens:
1. Sending a request to the distorting proxy
To begin sending requests to a distorting proxy like a residential proxy, you must obtain the necessary details of the proxy server. The proxy provider usually provides you with the proxy server’s address (IP address or domain name) and port numbers. If necessary, you also get the authentication details after you buy a residential proxy.
With access to the correct server details, you must configure your device to establish a connection with the server. The configuration steps vary with your device’s operating system, so consult the proxy server’s provider documentation to configure your device correctly. After configuring your device, you can send a request to access a website or other online resources.
Your device does not send the request directly to the target website’s server; it first conveys the request through the distorting proxy server.
2. Forwarding the request to the target server
Upon intercepting the request, the proxy server inspects the request’s header to determine its source and destination. Essentially, the server learns your IP address, that of the target server, and more details like the type of traffic (UDP or TCP).
After understanding the nature and destination of your request, the distorting proxy proceeds to manipulate specific details to mask your identity. One critical detail the proxy intentionally misrepresents is your IP address. It replaces it with a fake one, enhancing anonymity.
Once the proxy server modifies your request, it forwards it to the target server for processing.
3. Target server processes the request and responds
Unaware of the request’s actual source, the target server openly accepts and processes it. The target server fulfills the request’s demands and sends a web page, file, or any other desired data to the proxy server.
Even though a distorting proxy can hide your IP address and other details, some sophisticated servers can detect these changes. How? By comparing the fake IP address’s web activities with previous data points and patterns. However, distorting proxies can also analyze your previous web behavior patterns and assign your request packets an IP address matching the typical behavior pattern.
4. Response forwarding to your device
Since the distorting proxy records your original IP address, it knows where to send the response. So, it references its details and strips the fake IP address from the response packets. Then, it embeds the original IP address before forwarding the response packets to your device.
Once the response packets reach your device, it processes the response and displays the requested content. You can then interact with or use the requested resource.
To your device, it appears as though the response came directly from the target server. This is despite the distorting proxy intercepting and modifying the request packets.
Finally, it is also critical to consider that a distorting proxy can add latency to your network connection. The extent of latency depends on various factors, such as the proxy server’s configurations, the distance between your device and the proxy server, and the proxy server load.
So, seek a proxy provider committed to reducing the network performance impact of using their proxy services. For instance, a proxy provider can set up a caching mechanism to combat such an issue, ultimately improving and stabilizing your connection to their proxy servers.
Closing Words
In a nutshell, a distorting proxy is a proxy server that masks your IP address by replacing it with a fake one. This keeps your web activities and location anonymous, enhancing your privacy and opening up access to geo-blocked content. Explore this blog post to learn more about the merits of using a distorting proxy and how it works.