Cybersecurity and user privacy on the internet has become a crucial topic lately. Users throughout the world care about keeping their data private more than ever. Is a proxy search engine capable of protecting your information and providing peace of mind? Let’s take a look at how these tools can improve your web experience, and why you should consider using them!
Allow us to give you an example, and let us know if it sounds familiar. You’ve been searching the web and came across an advertisement on the random website. The ad showed the product you checked out a couple of days ago. The odds are that you used the Google search engine to look for that item, and it delivered information to the Google Ads platform.
But we can’t blame only Google because all major search engines collect data about you. It is the way they do business. By gathering that information, they tailor and show ads to attract your interest.
Here is the information a search engine will receive each time you use it:
As time passes, Google helps advertisers create your user profile and deliver personalized ads. You might think that browsing in incognito mode can help, but that only assists in hiding local traces. And a personalized advertising profile is the least of your concerns.
Take a look at the above chart. It shows the number of requests for user information disclosure made by governments throughout the world. The laws allow the authorities to ask for user data from Google, and the company will deliver them. That means anything a search engine learns about you could end up in the hands of a foreign intelligence service. That is what happened to around 80,000 users in the last six months of 2019, and that’s only the official statistics.
A proxy server performs a crucial role in any private search engine out there. If you would like to know more about the topic, we will start with the basics.
Now, you are connecting to the internet via your PC or mobile. It doesn’t matter because you have to use an internet service provider (ISP). They generate an IP address for your device, and you use it to communicate with websites, social media, and other online sources. Thanks to the IP address, the website you visit, search engines you use, and even your ISP will track your browsing history.
That is where a proxy server comes into play. The above graph portrays the use of these servers nicely. Think of proxies as intermediaries between you and the web. For example, if you enter a website address and execute your request, this will happen:
The process is similar when using a proxy search engine. You type in the query, and the platform communicates with a proxy. Proxy utilizes its IP address while protecting yours to deliver the desired information. It makes it virtually impossible for search engines to track you and collect personal data.