Proxy's: What Are They

[masakabassist]

I have been wondering recently what is a Proxy server and what do they do?

What is the benefit of one?
How do you set one up?
Is there any real need for one?

I know they are only three simple questions but if you could answer them for me that would be wonderful. :)

[Rich'[ard]]

well...being a student.
i use proxies to get on some sites blocked by our school :p

that's the benefit of one i guess.
but can't answer how to set up one.

btw: not pron or anything. i'm a good boy :santa:
can you believe they blocked OCF?! that's what i mainly use it for. and youtube sometimes.

[Rider200]

What is the benefit of one?
How do you set one up?
Is there any real need for one?

1) Proxy servers allow a connection through a firewall if the network is secured, in other words it opens a 'hole' for out bound traffic. If the traffic needs two way communication that can be setup also with what are called rules.

A rule tells the proxy software that a connection from an IP is allowed to either exit through the firewall with out restrictions or enter the through the firewall with restrictions, that is it can only connect to a given IP and/or service with a user id and password.

2) Depends on the Operating System. I use Wingate for my Proxy Server because I use Windows Server for my firewall/proxy server. Linux has both also, Novell used to have their own software but now uses Red Hat.

3) Yes, suppose you have a network. The network is sealed off from the internet with a hardware firewall and software firewall such as a multi homed server (multi homed means there are two or more network cards with different IP addresses, local network IP (intranet) and subnet mask, WAN IP (internet) and subnetmask, an maybe an IDSN Card).

Your local lan IP alows for any computer connected to the the local network through switches to connect to the Proxy server. Lets say you want your Video Conferenceing to go through the IDSN only, you would write a rule that says any connection to a certian IP will only go through the IDSN IP all other requests will be dropped. Or say you want a connection to one HTTP address, you can write a rule that all HTTP request go to that HTTP IP address. Most large corportations use this type of filtering to keep the employees from accesing unauthorized web sites while at work.

The use of annon Proxy servers do by pass securtiy and are a risk, if the Proxy admin was worth the pay they get they would have those IP's locked out.

Over the 4th of July weekend there was a cyber attack on US Gov web sites, this was an external attack that was a Denial Of Service (DOS) that only hit the firewall of the web sites (in other words overloaded the IP address with requests that were dropped). If the firewall/proxy server wasn't configured propperly then a deterimed hacker could have gotten in to the web server while this was going on and caused mischief or damage.

A proxy server will stop this from happening if the proxy software rules are properly wrtten.

Another use of a proxy server on a multi homed server will stop a trojan or spyware from calling home and sending data to the hacker, I have mine setup to block and log all out going requests that are not from programs used on my network that have access to the WAN, works pretty good, caught the Conflicker worm a couple of years ago before anyone knew about it, had me worried for sure!

My $0.000002

[I.M.O.G.]

I have been wondering recently what is a Proxy server and what do they do?

What is the benefit of one?
How do you set one up?
Is there any real need for one?

I know they are only three simple questions but if you could answer them for me that would be wonderful. :)

Proxies take the internet traffic from a diverse subset of systems and funnel them thru a single point. Most commonly this is used in medium to large businesses, and it reduces the total amount of internet traffic as well as allows user authentication (if you can't authenticate with the proxy server, you can't access the internet - this depends on how the proxy is configured, authentication isn't mandatory).

The proxy can be configured so that it caches pages - if 10 people in the organization request a page, that page won't need to be loaded from the internet each time. This also depends on how the proxy is configured.

A proxy can also be used on the webserver side rather than on the client side, to reduce server load and improve site performance. Squid is often used for this purpose:
http://www.squid-cache.org/

Then there's what the user above mentioned, open internet proxies which make your connection appear as tho its coming from somewhere else. So if your somewhere that filters websites, but doesn't filter certain open internet proxies, you can connect thru the proxy then contact websites which would otherwise be filtered because all your internet connection sees is that your going thru the proxy site and it doesn't see the connections you make thru it. Doing this is pretty much universally a violation of terms of service - if sites are filtered, they are filtered for a reason and you aren't supposed to be going to them over that connection.

How you setup a proxy depends on the specific proxy application your using and on what platform. This is an example for Squid on Ubuntu:
http://www.ubuntugeek.com/how-to-setup-transparent-squid-proxy-server-in-ubuntu.html

The third question has already been answered - if you want to do any of the things listed above, you could benefit from the use of a proxy.

[gangaskan]

;6155076"]well...being a student.
i use proxies to get on some sites blocked by our school :p

that's the benefit of one i guess.
but can't answer how to set up one.

btw: not pron or anything. i'm a good boy :santa:
can you believe they blocked OCF?! that's what i mainly use it for. and youtube sometimes.


keep in mind, they're blocked for a reason. you're on the schools network not yours some people fail to realize this.

i don't condone proxying out stuff in this matter, nor should it be used for malicious intent :)

[Rich'[ard]]

keep in mind, they're blocked for a reason. you're on the schools network not yours some people fail to realize this.

i don't condone proxying out stuff in this matter, nor should it be used for malicious intent :)
mm yeah.
i guess it's best to stop all these 14 year-olds downloading random stuff over the net and them playing games in class etc.
they can do all they want at home.

i used to check OC Forums at school whenever i happened to be on the computer in the school library. our librarians is tight as, so we get kicked off if we do something other than school work. i happened to be looking on OCF, then next time i went to check the site, it was blocked as a 'chatroom'

:(

[gangaskan]

;6156187"]mm yeah.
i guess it's best to stop all these 14 year-olds downloading random stuff over the net and them playing games in class etc.
they can do all they want at home.

its not just the 14 year olds ;)


when we put our filtering in and started agressively blocking i got alot of "hey, how come we cant get on ebay?" questions alot.

people think because they're on the computer its their time, their internet. what they do not comprehend is that your not really.

we block things for two reasons

1.) productivity -- more work done if you're not browsing stuff you shouldnt be, however, its proven with some study that it may boost it by some percentage.

2.) Adware, malware, spyware, any "ware" and viruses -- if you dont, you'll be spending countless hours cleaning machines where as it could be used for something productive

[UmHelp]

Proxies save me gigs and gigs of unnecessary net traffic. I cannot live without one in my home network. 572.695 megs just today. I think that alone speaks of the usefulness of proxies.

Today's stats:
Days Hits MB
Today 8420 572.695

Top two domains with most cache hits:
Domain Hits MB Cache Hit
c1.neweggimages.com 5130 6.234 4627 (90.2%)
www.ocforums.com 3447 31.199 1433 (41.6%)

I guess it shows which sites I vist the most :D

[masakabassist]

Thanks for answering my questions guys, I would have posted back sooner but my behind hasn't touched the ground over the past few days.

[Wraith]

Bumping because my question relates to the topic.

What sort of horsepower is needed for a proxy server? I know it cant be much, so I was planning to pick up a used EEE to setup a proxy server for myself in the US to watch hulu through since I'll be spending the next two years in japan