Using an Anonymous Proxy
Anonymous surfing is the ability to travel the Internet completely incognito; no one knows your identity. Another part of this is not being liable to tracking either. An anonymous proxy can change your IP address, which is what sites use to tell who and where you are. The proxy substitutes your IP for theirs, so it appears like they are trying to access the site, and not you.
Another useful service a proxy can provide is getting past firewalls. Oftentimes, schools and workplaces have blocking programs that block “fun” sites such as Myspace, Youtube, FaceBook, etc. The sites block these students or workers because the server that they surf the Internet from has placed bans on the URL of those specific sites. This is easily combatable! When you surf all of the other sites using a proxy, the computer server only sees that you went on the proxy site a bunch of times. This worker could go to the site on a proxy server, and surf all of the sites he or she wished, being completely uncensored. Remember that while you may be able to access the sites, your boss or teacher will still likely be able to see what you’ve been up to, so you can do it, but there is still a chance you will get caught.
Using these proxy servers also offers one more inherent benefit. On public computers often used by many people, the proxy can delete all information when the session is done. So, if one worker decides to use a proxy to do some banking, a worker on a later shift couldn’t hack the computer to recover the previous worker’s information.
Anonymous surfing isn’t all fun and games though. While you are hidden from the rest of the Internet, (and your boss) the proxy can still monitor all of your online activities. This means you should always trust the proxy you are on. Bandwidth costs a lot of money, and free proxies obviously aren’t making any. They do stay afloat though, and with the wealth of information and money at their fingertips, I would bet it is a bit of illicit activities that get them by.
Always use a fee-based proxy; this way you know they aren’t stealing credit card numbers to get by. In addition, and encryption program could bolster your anonymous browsing even more.
