Using a free proxy helps a lot in many situations. A paid proxy has many advantages over them, including better privacy and bandwidth. But private proxies are the best of their kind, providing the most advanced experience. What makes these proxies private? And what are their advantages for users? Here we break it down in the simplest words possible.
What Is a Private Proxy?
A private proxy is a proxy server that grants you a dedicated remote IP address. While with most shared and public proxy, an address is shared between as many users as can connect, a private one is only assigned to you. This enables you to build a stronger virtual identity and experience less technical issues with bandwidth, ping, or connection speed and not being banned when recognized.
It is usually a paid service, though it doesn’t cost much. Usually, there are two types of private proxies: residential or datacenter. There is a difference:
- Residential proxies emulate a regular Internet user who goes online through their ISP, with a dedicated IP address.
- Datacenter proxies are placed on the same servers, through virtual machines, and take IP addresses from the same pool.
Though datacenter ones are cheaper, they can be compromised and, for example, recognized as spam. The final decision, though, depends on your requirements.
Private vs. Shared Proxy
When you use a public proxy, whether paid or free, all its users are assigned an IP from the proxy’s pool. This gets most of the jobs done, but there may be some disadvantages of this solution:
- These proxies are often familiar to cybersecurity systems, so your access to certain resources may be restricted instead of being granted. Just because of the proxy.
- You cannot use your IP address under proxy as your static one. This may cause issues with online payment when the security system uses digital fingerprints (a spoiler: it does almost every time).
- If someone else violates the rules of a certain site from the IP it shares with you, you can be banned along with them, though you haven’t done a thing bad.
- Your bandwidth is limited. This is less probable with paid proxies, but it often happens with cheap ones.
And if your activity requires creating a virtual identity with its own static IP that appears like going online from home somewhere in Canada or Italy while your real location is on another continent, you need a private proxy. It is great if you, for example, lead a long-term ad campaign in a certain country abroad and need to see how it looks for a user from that country.
On the other hand, if you need to change your virtual location frequently or to hide your real identity rather than create a long-time simulated one, you’d rather use a shared proxy with a good reputation or use several private proxies for different countries and regions. Sometimes this is a better solution.
Conclusion
Knowing the difference between proxy types, you can choose the proxy you need for your business. There are chances you’ll need one for every virtual location you need; well, it will make sense to provide them to have strong virtual identities and avoid technical issues. And don’t forget to check your proxy provider’s reputation before sharing any sensitive data with it.
Featured Image by Kevin Morison stockvault.net
