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Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

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Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#101

Post by aussieguy1234 »

kawsper wrote: post #83
whartung wrote: post #6

My understanding is that routing through residential IPs is a part of the business of some VPN providers. I don't know how above board they are on this (as in notifying customers that this may happen, however buried in the usage agreement, or even allowing them to opt out). But, my main point, is that the whole business is "on the up and up" vs some dark botnet.

Oxylabs sells proxies for scrapers, I suppose you can use the socks-proxy as a VPN, and they claim to use Honeygain. Honeygain is a platform where people sell their residential internet connection and bandwidth to these companies for money. For comparison Honeygain pays someone 10 cents per GB, and Oxylabs sells it for $8/GB.

That takes buying low and selling high to a whole new level

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#102

Post by MBCook »

thot_experiment wrote: post #31
packetslave wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I have never interacted with a reddit employee who wasn't actively gaslighting me about the platform. Do you even use the site? I talked to a PM recently who genuinely thought the phone app was something people liked.

There are people who actively like it.

I don’t. But they 100% exist.

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#103

Post by chatmasta »

7thpower wrote: post #91
chatmasta wrote: post #86

Why are they leaving Bright Data (aka Illuminati aka Hola VPN) untouched? They are doing this exact scheme on an industrial scale.

They have a robust KYC that appears to serve, at least in large part, as a way to stay off the shit list of companies with the resources to pursue recourse. Source: went through that process, ended up going a different route. The rep was refreshingly transparent about where they get the data, why the have the kyc process (aside from regulatory compliance). Ended up going with a different provider who has been cheaper…

Yeah, they make you do a Skype interview (or probably Zoom interview nowadays). You could call this KYC or collateral, depending on your view of the company. It does limit the nefariousness of their clientele but I doubt they do much, or any, monitoring of actual traffic after onboarding (not for compliance reasons, anyway).

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#104

Post by what »

piskov wrote: post #23
packetslave wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Yes you do. Private VPS for personal VPN in Netherlands (digital ocean), then Hungary (some small local DC) — both are blocked from day one. > You've been blocked by network security. To continue, log in to your Reddit account or use your developer token. If you think you've been blocked by mistake, file a ticket below and we'll look into it.

Sounds like you just need to sign in or use the api?

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#105

Post by Nextgrid »

vachina wrote: post #96
CodeMage wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Getting rid of malware is good. A private for-profit company exercising its power over the Internet, not so much. We should have appropriate organizations for this.

The proxies is the reason why you get spam in your Google search result, spam in your Play store (by means of fake good reviews), basically spam in anything user generated. It directly affects Google and you, I don’t see why they should not do this.

Spam in Google search results is due to Google happily taking money from the spammers in exchange for promoting their spam, or that the spam sites benefit Google indirectly by embedding Google Ads/Analytics.

I don't see any spam in Kagi, so clearly there is a way to detect and filter it out. Google is simply not doing so because it would cut into their profits.

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#106

Post by Nextgrid »

vachina wrote: post #98
trollbridge wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it serves the purpose of blocking this kind of proxy traffic that isn't in Google's personal best interests. Only Google is allowed to scrape the web.

This is demonstrably false by the success of many scrapers from AI companies.

LLMs aren't a good indicator of success here because an LLM trained on 80% of the data is just as good as one trained on 100%, assuming the type/category of data is distributed evenly. Proxies help when you do need to get access to 100% of the data including data behind social media loginwalls.

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#107

Post by Nextgrid »

yuliyp wrote: post #79
londons_explore wrote: post #9

We need more residential proxies, not less. I've had enough of companies saying "you're connecting from an AWS IP address, therefore you aren't allowed in, or must buy enterprise licensing". Reddit is an example which totally blocks all data to non-residential IP's. I want exactly the same content visible no matter who you are or where you are connecting from, and a robust network of residential proxies is a stepping…

The end game of that is no useful content being accessible without login, or needing some sort of other proof-of-legitimacy.

That's already the case (irrespective of residential proxies) because content only serves as bait for someone to hand over personal information (during signup/login) and then engage with ads.

Proxies actually help with that by facilitating mass account registration and scraping of the content without wasting a human's time "engaging" with ads.

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#108

Post by bigfatkitten »

happyopossum wrote: post #70
bdcravens wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many are "compensated" (in the way of software they didn't pay for), so the real question is that of disclosure (in which case many software vendors check the box in the most minimal way possible by including it as fine print during the install)

No, the question is not just disclosure. People have their bandwidth stolen, and sometimes internet access revoked due to this kind of fraud and misuse - disclosure wouldn’t solve that

If they're lucky. Sometimes people have their doors kicked in by armed police.

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#109

Post by Nextgrid »

UqWBcuFx6NV4r wrote: post #95
IhateAI wrote: post #75

How do you stop mobile proxies operating through similar nefarious business models... CGNAT prevents you from easily identifying the exit nodes.

Working with network operators.

Network operators have zero reason to care, they get paid per the GB for the bandwidth.

Re: Disrupting the largest residential proxy network

#110

Post by 1vuio0pswjnm7 »

trollbridge wrote: post #26
xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #4

> These efforts to help keep the broader digital ecosystem safe supplement the protections we have to safeguard Android users on certified devices. We ensured Google Play Protect, Android’s built-in security protection, automatically warns users and removes applications known to incorporate IPIDEA SDKs, and blocks any future install attempts. Nice to see Google Play Protect actually serving a purpose for once.

Yeah, it serves the purpose of blocking this kind of proxy traffic that isn't in Google's personal best interests. Only Google is allowed to scrape the web.

"Only Google is allowed to scrape the web."

If I'm not mistaken, the plaintiffs in the US v Google antitrust litigation in the DC Circuit tried to argue that website operators are biased toward allowing Google to crawl and against allowing other search engines to do the same

The Court rejected this argument because the plaintiffs did not present any evidence to support it

For someone who does not follow the web's history, how would one produce direct evidence that the bias exists

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