![]() ![]() ![]() The above setup provides a layer of privacy beyond the traditional setup of direct end-user-to-website communication. As a result, the web server is unable to distinguish and personally identify the IP addresses of any users.Īn Even More Complicated Anonymizer Setup Consequently, web servers receive requests that originated from hundreds of end-users through a single IP address (that of the anonymizer). A Somewhat More Complicated Anonymizer SetupĪ more sophisticated (and more realistic) anonymizer setup pools hundreds or even thousands of end-users through one or more anonymizing intermediaries. Instead of calling them myself, I could call a friend and ask him to call them on my behalf, place my order, and then let me know how much it will cost and the estimated delivery time. (Note, though, that to prevent deep packet inspection, an anonymizer must also encrypt data).Īn anonymizer is an intermediary server between the end-user and the website that acts as a proxy for the user, effectively accessing websites on the end-user’s behalf, thereby hiding the end-user’s IP address (and perhaps other information).Ī Real-World Analogy: Let’s say I want to order pizza from the local pizza shop, but I do not want them to have my phone number, which they could get from caller ID if I called them directly. Under certain circumstances, an anonymizer can obscure the final destination of the end-user’s request, thereby preventing network operators or other intermediaries from shaping traffic in this manner. For example, bandwidth for information from educational websites may be prioritized over Voice-over-IP bandwidth. Some ISPs and access points allocate their Internet bandwidth depending on which websites users are accessing. They can use an anonymizer as an intermediary between themselves and the website, thus preventing disclosure of their IP address to the website. Some Internet users may fear that the disclosure of their IP address to a website could increase their risk of being hacked. But an anonymizer located outside the censoring country can serve as an intermediary, enabling the end-user to circumvent censorship and access the restricted content. Some governments prevent their citizens from accessing certain websites by blocking requests to specific IP addresses. By causing thousands of users’ activity to be pooled together under a single IP address, anonymizers make it difficult for search engines and other websites–and, therefore, governments–to distinguish the web activities of individual users. Some privacy advocates such as EFF and CDT have expressed legitimate concern at the trend of governments subpoenaing records of the Internet activity of citizens. Compilation and Disclosure of Search Histories.Whether this assembling of a “digital dossier” causes any harm to the user is debatable, but users concerned about such profiles can use an anonymizer to make it difficult to build such profiles, particularly by changing their IP address regularly. ![]() Many online advertising networks build profiles of likely interests associated with a unique cookie ID and/or IP address. Anonymizers (such as Tor) allow privacy-sensitive users to protect themselves from the following potential privacy intrusions: Regardless, the goal of this ongoing series is to detail the tools available to users to implement their own subjective preferences. Some of these concerns are quite serious, while others may be more debatable. Among Internet users, there are a variety of concerns about privacy, security and the ability to access content. ![]()
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