What is a Proxy

A proxy gives you the ability to unblock websites that have been blocked on your computer at school or work. While using a proxy you temporarily change your IP address so that website owners will not be able to trace who has been on their website.


The two main proxy software's are PHProxy and CGI Proxy. You will commonly see these while browsing around for proxy websites.

What Else can a Proxy do?

A proxy can not only change your IP address but it can do many other things. A proxy will give you the ability to remove client side scripting (for example: Javascript), remove images and remove advertisements.

CGI Proxy


CGI Proxy is not as commonly used as PHProxy as it puts a lot of strain on the owner's server. CGI Proxy does not give as many options as PHP Proxy does but offers full anonymity.

The options you can use while using CGI Proxy are:

  • No cookies
  • No scripts
  • No ads
  • No referrer
  • Show this form

CGI Proxies are harder to find but you'll know that your IP address has been completely hidden.

PHProxy


PHProxy offers lots of options while browsing on it but it's anonymity is not as good as CGI Proxy.

The options you can use while using CGI Proxy are:

  • Includes a mini URL-form on every HTML page
  • Remove client-side scripting (i.e. JavaScript)
  • Accept HTTP cookies
  • Show images
  • Show referring website in HTTP headers
  • Use rotate13 encoding on the URL
  • Use base64 encoding on the URL
  • Strip meta HTML tags
  • Strip Website title
  • Store cookies for this session only
  • Open URL in a new window

Some PHProxy proxies may not have all of these options as the owner may have turned them off.