Which free anonymous proxy should I use?

Often people will want to know and will ask me, what would be the best free anonymous proxy to use?  Honestly there is no clear cut answer to that question.  Proxies that appear to be good may disappear from use on the internet within an hour.  So even if I was to recommend a very good fast proxy that would keep you safe online, by the time you got to the end of reading this article it could be gone and no longer be usable.  There is a simple reason that proxies like these never stay live on the internet for any length of time.

First off the cost of bandwidth, that alone can add up to be a large sum of money monthly.  Then taking into consideration the thousands of people wanting to surf the internet using your anonymous proxies, your bandwidth bill is only going to grow and bandwidth is only one part of the costs involved to running a proxy server, there are several other components.  You are probably wondering why if it costs so much, what is the purpose of someone making available free anonymous proxies for the general public to use?

There are two main reasons that free anonymous proxies are set up:

The first is that the owner of the proxy server is not even aware that their proxies are being used by someone else.  This can easily happen by accident when a server is not configured properly, leaving a port open, which then allows all kinds of anonymous connections to the server, instead of only being used for specific users.   Many times the only way a datacenter administrator will know that something is not right is by either the large bandwidth bill, looking at the usage graphs or seeing a massive performance decrease in the server.  Unless you are an experienced tech, this is a mistake that can happen easily.

Now for the real reason and one that should be a major concern for anyone who uses or is considering using a proxy on the internet is … Crime .. Identity Theft.  To these internet pirates everyone’s personal information is very valuable.  Everything from your bank account numbers, credit card numbers, your address, social security number and all your personal account and logins.  And the list goes on.  These thieves will stop at nothing to get your personal information; they seek out servers, usually from large companies and compromise them.  Then they take these proxies they have just stole and list them on websites for people to find and use and then steal all the data passing through that proxy.

Due to the danger of using these proxies the risk is far too great and out weighs all  the benefits.  Remember never use any of your personal or confidential information if you choose to use free proxies.  If your privacy and safety is much more important to you, but you are not able to pay for a secure professional service, then it may be worthwhile looking into TOR.  Although the connection may be much slower than what you are used to, it provides some anonymity although there are still many security issue so it would be best not to use it for secure requirements like online banking and stock trading etc.