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Ask Slashdot: Choosing Anonymous Proxies?
bradley13 writes "There are lots of anonymous proxies out there, and anyone concerned about their privacy probably uses one for at least some of their web browsing. The Megaupload story highlights the fact that having servers in the USA is not a great idea. There are also other countries one may not want to trust. Oddly, very few proxy services mention where their equipment is located. What anonymous proxy services do you use? What criteria do you use to select them? How paranoid are you, and for what types of Internet usage?"
I do not trust Anonymous proxies. So I always host my own "anonymous" proxies myself. That is what I call secure!
How do you figure that's "anonymous"? You are paying for the Internet connection so SOMEBODY knows who you are. If you are using a machine at work to do same, then still, SOMEBODY knows who you are. The bottom line is, there is no truly anonymous proxies anymore...not that there really were any to begin with. Somebody always knows unless you are IP spoofing on top of a proxy, but even that is becoming less secure as governments and law enforcement get more capable.
So your anon proxy has the same IP address as your your named account with your ISP, so all your anon traffic is immediately traceable without any effort whatsoever, directly to you. That means your traffic is most definitely NOT anonymous!