How to Use Proxies To Enhance Information Security: Six Practical Ways
Proxy servers are often used as a mediator between the client and the website or online service. Routing traffic through a proxy allows users to hide their real location and IP. Also, proxies can be used by companies (reverse proxies usually) to solve multiple tasks. And one of the most important is securing corporate infrastructure. Today we’ll talk about how proxies really help here.
Hiding information about the infrastructure
Often reverse proxies are used as SSL gateways. In this case, the company can reply to inbound HTTP requests with no risk of exposing the real structure of its network. Serving as a mediator between external clients and the internal network’s backend, a proxy is a handy tool to hide the corporate infrastructure.
Without a proxy, all requests should be routed to end servers, and they would send replies. Such communication could give cybercriminals tips on how the network is built, and possible bottlenecks in its security.
Another type of proxy useful for security-related tasks is residential proxies. These proxies are basically IP-addresses assigned to regular users (homeowners) by their ISP. These addresses are marked in regional internet registries (RIR). So, if you use a residential proxy, all requests sent from the particular IP will be indistinguishable from the ones submitted by regular users.
Often such proxies are used for competitive intelligence, data scraping, and bypassing anti-bot systems. Companies can use rotated residential proxies to boost the security of their networks and websites. If requests generated by malicious actors will be answered by servers that seem to be located in multiple countries and regions, it will be impossible to gather information about the real corporate network.
Infatica provides such rotating proxy service. Many of our customers use it as a solution for lifting up information security to a whole new level.
Traffic encryption and decryption
As said above, in the corporate world, reverse proxies often used. Usually, this is a proxy server located behind the firewall of the corporate network. It redirects inbound requests from external clients to internal end servers. So, reverse proxies can serve a point where traffic is encrypted and decrypted,
Such proxies can decrypt HTTPS traffic and send plain content over the internal network. This has multiple pros. First, you won’t have to install certificates to all servers within the network, which can be costly and time-consuming. Second, you will get a single point to configure SSL/TLS, which will reduce the tech team workload. Third, your internal servers won’t have to process heavy encrypted traffic, dealing with light plain content. This will result in increased performance.
Monitoring and security spending optimization
Using proxies is also helpful for the overall security level, as in such cases, the company gets a single entry point to its network. This means you can easily monitor and log all traffic at the border of your network.
Also, as all servers behind the firewall first send their traffic to a proxy, securing this single server results in an increased security level along with reduced costs. Without a proxy, you would have to invest in the protection of all servers that could be potentially reached by external clients.
Access control
Not only proxies are useful for load balancing and traffic management, but they can be used for access control purposes. A proxy server can serve as a gateway for access to specific network segments or services both for external and internal clients (i.e., employees).
Final thoughts
Companies are actively using proxy technology for solving security-related tasks. Proxies are useful as a tool for access control, traffic encryption, decryption, and even hiding the corporate infrastructure from hackers. Join them today!
