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Proxy Chaining – 3 Ultimate Configuration Techniques

Guides, Dec-03-20225 mins read

Proxy chaining process accelerates the power with multiple levels of proxies chained together. As the Internet serves people in a wide range of applications, proxy chaining can help people with increased security features. From the simple surfing process to handling confidential transactions, people tend to make use of every available feature of the network. With the ultimate capacity of the Internet, people are performing high-level operations, like data aggregation and scraping.

Looking for a remedy that could multiply your speed and protect you from IP blocks? Let’s dive into this article for a solution called “proxy chaining” and learn how it can help you simplify web scrapping and other advanced tasks.

Table of Contents

What Is a Proxy?

A proxy is a solution that can hide a client’s IP address to appear in the network with their proxy IP to ensure the anonymity of the client. A proxy is an intermediate server between two communication nodes of the network. This intermediate device works on behalf of one of the client nodes and hides its original IP address from the network. They forward the request of this client node to the server node of the communication network. So that the client’s identity or IP address is not known to the servers.

A proxy does not only work on behalf of clients, they also work on the server-side in some cases. Proxies are directly connected to servers and can stop clients from directly reaching the server. They receive the request from the client’s IP address and respond to them on behalf of the server. This minimizes the crowd on the server-side. Proxies cache the data from the server and make use of these cached pages to reply to the upcoming client requests. These cached versions can reduce the response time.

What Is Proxy Chaining?

Proxy chaining is an enhanced proxy technique that also strives to improve the security of the users. Proxy chaining is the method of chaining multiple proxies back to back to ensure high security. Proxy users believe that hackers or Internet Service Providers will find it hard to track the original IP address of clients with one proxy server. But, what if we use various proxy servers? Won’t it increase the security measures tenfold?

Yes, proxy users create a proxy chain and configure multiple proxies between the client and the destination server. Thus, the websites have to cross these multiple stages to track the client’s IP address. Proxy chaining is a quick and easy way to aggregate data from multiple sources as this multi-level security system can withstand hacking and helps users stay anonymous. 

Why Do We Need Proxy Chaining?

The one major benefit of using a proxy is to overcome IP bans. Extracting data from multiple sources with one IP address can result in IP bans. The Internet Service Providers or websites can easily track an IP address in the system if you are not using a proxy. As proxies promote anonymity and allow accessing geo-blocked sites, proxy chaining does the same, only more effectively.

As proxies in the proxy chain forward traffic from the client to a proxy server, then from that proxy server to another proxy server, it makes it hard for the websites to track the user and ban them from their site. This internal network with multiple proxy levels also helps to store cached pages from different websites. These cached versions are like a photocopy of the data in the destination server. Using this speeds up the processing time and responds to the user in a short while.

How Does Proxy Chaining Work?

Proxy chaining is an internal network with a number of proxies connected in a chain. Users can use the existing proxy servers of the system and configure them into a chain, one after another. Let us consider, that a user connects nearly 3 to 5 proxies in a chain. Let’s name them Proxy1, proxy2, and proxy3. Now, we have a client, server, and three proxies in between, as shown in the figure below.

Proxy chaining – Working
Proxies generally act on behalf of another device. This way Proxy1 masks the client IP address, Proxy2 hides the identity of Proxy1, then Proxy3 masks the identity of Proxy2. These multiple layers of protection strengthen the security system. To make use of the quality proxy servers of Proxyscrape, click here

3 Ways to Configure Proxy Chaining

Proxy Chaining in Windows

Configuring proxy servers in a proxy chain is similar to adding proxies to the system. Here are the steps to demonstrate the manual process of adding more than one proxy to a chain.

  • Click on the ‘Search‘ icon in the windows tab.
  • Enter ‘Control Panel’ in the search bar.
  • From the list, select the ‘Network and Options‘ option.
  • Select ‘Internet Options‘ from the list.
  • Click on the ‘Connections‘ tab.
  • Under the ‘Local Area Network (settings)’ section, click on the ‘LAN settings” button.
  • Under the ‘Proxy Server Configuration‘ section, click on the checkbox named “Use a proxy server for your LAN.”
  • This will display the already existing proxy servers in use.
  • Click on the ‘Advanced‘ button.
  • Here, add the set of proxies separated by commas.
  • All these proxies can be configured into a proxy chain.

Proxy Chaining with Web Browsers

  • Click on the “Customize” button of the browser window, which looks like three dots in a vertical line. 
  • Click on the ‘Settings‘ option from the list.
  • Enter ‘proxy‘ in the search bar of the “settings” panel.
  • Then select the ‘open your computer’s proxy settings.”
  • Use the ‘advanced or manual proxy setup’ section.
  • Click on the ‘set up‘ button under the ‘manual‘ section.
  • Then enable the ‘proxy server‘ option, then fill the proxy list with commas in between. 

Tor browser and Proxy Chaining

Tor is a web browser that promotes anonymous browsing. These web browsers can mask the web traffic from the network, which can make it hard to find the identity of the user. This encrypts the data packets of the user requests, which can make it hard for the network to track the message. This browser does not ensure 100% security, but it still keeps the user’s IP address under wraps. TOR website also allows proxy chaining, which supports anonymous web browsing.

Benefits of Proxy Chaining

Benefits of Proxy Chaining
Secure – Multiple proxy servers can ensure a high level of security. One proxy acts as a security agent of another proxy that is already securing a client. This repeated process strengthens the security of the communication and allows the client to work as an anonymous user.
Multiplied Power – Proxy features like anonymity, speed, and security works more effectively as these proxy chains use multiple proxies. The accumulated power of all the proxies in the chain multiples the efficiency of the existing proxy features.
Speed – As many proxies work in a process, this increases the speed. When a proxy forwards traffic from a client to a server, it receives the response and sends it back to the client. In this process, a proxy caches the data on different websites This cached data reduces the processing time.
The Cache ProcessCache memory usually holds recent or frequently accessed data. Instead of reaching the server every time to get a response, the proxy may make a copy of the response and store it away for future purposes.

Drawbacks of Proxy Chaining

  • The proxy chaining technique is not easy to hack. Still, you can not say that it is impossible. With keen efforts, like tracking the IP addresses of all chaining proxies, tracking the client’s IP address is also possible.
  • If one proxy in the chain stops working, the entire process will stop. Users have to replace the damaged proxy or remove the proxy altogether.
  • You must keep up with your own replacements and maintenance. As this technique works as a chain, they work as a dependent model. If one of the proxies fails, the entire chain needs to be remodeled. Thus, the maintenance cost can become high.
  • The cache memory can reduce the processing time for sure, but there may be a contradiction as the process has to pass through multiple levels.

Why Choose Proxyscrape for Proxy Chaining?

High BandwidthProxyscrape provides proxies with unlimited bandwidth, making it easy for users to handle multiple proxies in a chain.
Uptime – Proxyscrape ensures 100% uptime. Proxies function throughout the day so that users can maintain the proxy chain throughout the day. 
Multiple Types – A good proxy provider should furnish a proxy of all types to fulfill the user’s requirements. Proxyscrape provides shared proxies, like data center proxies, residential proxies, and dedicated proxies, like private proxies. The proxy chain may require multiple types of proxies for each function they prefer. 
Global Proxy – We offer proxies from more than 100 countries. There are also proxies for different protocols, like HTTP proxies and Socks4, and socks5 proxies.
Cost-Efficient – Here, the premium proxies are of reasonable costs and have high bandwidth. Check out our attractive prices and huge proxy options.
Proxyscrape is the proxy provider solution that supports various applications like scraping, maintaining anonymity, and overcoming restrictions. Dedicated proxies will have a unique IP address for each user so that the web servers and ISPs will not easily track the identity of the users. Shared proxies like data center proxies and residential proxies provide proxy pools with different proxy types to unblock the blocked sites with multiple proxies.
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Frequently Asked Questions

1. How many proxies can we add to a proxy chain?

Users can configure a proxy chain with as many proxies as they need. But 5 to 6 proxies are preferable because this protects the system from time-lapse issues and can increase the security of the communication.

2. What are some other techniques that use multiple proxies? 

Load Balancers – Use more than one proxy to forward traffic and split them among proxy servers.
Rotating Proxies – Works with a pool of IP addresses as they automatically shift to the next IP address after a particular period.
Proxy Switchers – Uses more than one proxy and switches among them per the requirement of the process.

3. Will chaining proxies give me 100% results?

Chaining proxies can increase security for sure, but users can not rely on this completely. There may be cases when one proxy server fails, and the system may lack in efficiency, taking more time to complete the process.

4. Can I proxy a proxy?

Yes, proxy chaining is an example of proxying a proxy. A proxy that is working on behalf of another node can also have a proxy work on their behalf. This process is known as ‘proxy a proxy’.

5. Can we use proxy chaining in a reverse proxy model?

Yes, when the proxy chains work for the server-side to protect their identity, it is a reverse proxy chain.

Conclusion

We learned how chaining multiple proxies can benefit users by improving security features. If you want to experience a quality proxy service with multiple proxies in a chain, get the suitable proxies from ProxyScrape, which can provide proxies of all categories and types. If you want to stay anonymous while browsing data in the network, use the TOR web browser that can ensure anonymous browsing. This method is not suitable for high-level applications, like scrapping. To hide the physical IP address of your system, use proxy chaining in the windows method. Proxy chaining is applicable for other Operating Systems, like macOS, as well.