We here at ProxyScrape have been providing a free proxy list for quite a while now, but admittingly we have to say that free proxies aren’t always safe to use. This is because free proxies do not always provide the anonymity you did expect while browsing the internet and might be malicious. They can be malicious in various ways, such as by injecting ads, tracking your activities, and logging your data such as phone numbers, emails, and location.
In most cases, you will be better off with alternatives such as datacenter proxies or residential proxies, which are maintained by professionals with no malicious intent.
In this article, we will go more in-depth into how public proxies might be unsafe to use.
Proxy anonymity levels
For some people, proxy anonymity matters a great deal because they do not want their original identity revealed.
Er zijn drie soorten anonimiteitsniveaus:
- Transparent proxy: does not hide your IP Address.
- Anonymous proxy: hides your IP address but does reveal that you are using a proxy server.
- Elite proxy: hides both your IP address and the fact that you are using a proxy server at all.
Transparent proxies are a significant problem when it comes to free proxies, especially with HTTP proxies. Analytics on the public HTTP proxies that we have checked show that at least 55% of the proxies are transparent. Transparent proxies will show your original IP address to the target. 6% of the public HTTP proxies are anonymous and will show to the target that you are connected via a proxy. Only 39% of the shared proxies are elite and will not reveal any traces to your target that you are hiding behind a proxy.
When you want to stay anonymous, make sure to only use elite proxies!
Traffic manipulation & modification
People who host a proxy can modify the content you see when visiting a website. These modifications can be malicious.
Research shows that 38.21% of all HTTP proxies perform some sort of content modification. Luckily only 5.15% are malicious.
Vormen van niet-kwaadaardige wijziging van de inhoud proxy :
- Blokkeren van advertenties en trackers
- Website caching
Vormen van kwaadaardige proxy inhoudswijziging:
- Injecteren of vervangen van advertenties
- Collecting user information such as location, email, phone number
- Volgen van muis/toetsenbord
- Volgen met cookies
- Onveilige sites aanvragen
Wanneer u een openbare proxy gebruikt, moet u zich ervan bewust zijn dat de proxy die u gebruikt, kan wijzigen wat u op de website ziet. Sommige wijzigingen die proxies aanbrengt, kunnen kwaadaardiger zijn dan andere.
Additional problems with public proxies
Public proxy lifespan
As you already know, public proxies get used by a tremendous amount of users; this causes a lot of load on the proxy servers. Research done by the University of Washington estimates that each public proxy could be using up to 300 MB of data per second. As a result, most open proxies’ lifespan is very short since it is very resource-intensive to operate one. It is estimated that the median lifespan of a free proxy is only seven days long.
Blacklisting of public proxies
Een ander groot probleem met openbare proxies is dat ze zeer snel op de zwarte lijst van bekende websites komen te staan.
Daar zijn twee belangrijke redenen voor:
- De websites gebruiken een dienst om proxy gebruik te detecteren. Aangezien de proxies voor iedereen openbaar is, is dit heel gemakkelijk op te sporen. De websites kunnen dit doen met diensten als MaxMind.
- De proxies wordt veel gebruikt voor de website door andere mensen, en de toegang wordt geblokkeerd.
Since free proxies are blacklisted quickly from many targets, they may not be of great use to you, and you might want to look at their alternatives.
Alternatives to free proxies
Since free proxies aren’t the best choice most of the time, what should you choose? It, of course, depends on your use-case.
Er zijn twee belangrijke soorten andere categorieën proxy :
- Datacenter proxies: maintained by professionals in a datacenter
- Residential proxies: residential IPs combined in a proxy network
Wanneer moet u ze gebruiken?
When you should choose datacenter proxies
Datacenter proxies are maintained by professionals and generally have a faster response time and greater bandwidth than their alternatives.
De meeste datacenter proxy providers prijzen hun dienst op basis van het aantal proxies dat u koopt in plaats van op basis van het verkeer dat u verbruikt.
Here are some scenarios you should consider datacenter proxies:
- Your target is very unlikely to ban you quickly on a specific IP address.
- You use a lot of traffic and have a limited budget. Datacenter proxies often come with unlimited or cheaply priced traffic.
When you should choose residential proxies
Residential proxies are the more expensive and are often priced by the amount of traffic you consume, but you are less likely to be banned.
U moet residentiële proxies kiezen in een van de volgende scenario's:
- Je doelwebsite verbiedt je snel wanneer botverkeer wordt gedetecteerd.
- Uw tijd is kostbaar, en u kunt het zich niet veroorloven lang geblokkeerd te zijn.
- U heeft proxies nodig van een specifiek land of stad die niet door datacenter proxies worden geleverd.
Andere voordelen van residentiële proxies :
- U krijgt toegang tot een pool van miljoenen IP-adressen over de hele wereld.
- Je doelwit weet niet dat je een proxy gebruikt, en denkt dat je een gewone gebruiker bent.
Conclusie
In most cases, we would suggest against using free public proxies and go with alternatives like datacenter proxies or residential proxies instead. The reason being that most free proxies are not safe is because they are either not anonymous or are performing something malicious with your browsing activity.