Safe web journey

THE POPULARITY of the Net attracts many entrepreneurs who come out regularly with new services and ways to exploit the hidden potential of this technology. Everyone travels through the cyberspace to avail of the innumerable services coursing through the huge network. Like two sides of a coin, the Net also has its negatives. One such thing facing an ordinary netizen is the threat of his/her Net activities being monitored by others with varied interests and objectives. This week some of the services /utilities that help us navigate the Net anonymously are discussed.

Need for anonymous web travel

While accessing a web service, the browser usually passes over certain information - the IP address of the machine, the type of the browser, the machine's operating system, the site from which the target site was reached and the like - to the server that hosts the service. This valuable information that gets logged (if the logging option is on) by the server can be used by the owner of the service to make certain conclusions on the nature of the browser's Net travel. As already discussed in one of the issues in this column, this information can be used by others (for example, an advertiser can use the data to understand your interests and tastes and formulate a customised marketing strategy finetuned to your personal needs).

Anonymous proxy servers

A proxy is something that sits between the browser and the web services on the Net. When you access a site through a proxy, you browser sends the access request to the proxy server and the proxy in turn grabs the info from the target site and passes it on to you. A popular area where the proxy technique is effectively used is to speed up the Net access. Here, the proxy server stores the web pages accessed earlier by the user through it and delivers a page from its local storage if it is available; else it collects the page from the target server and sends it to the client. Another kind of proxy server, known as anonymous proxy server, lets you navigate the Net without disclosing your real identity.

Anonymity 4 Proxy

There are many programs that connect you automatically to a proxy server while you browse a site. One such program (1 MB) is the Anonymity 4 Proxy (A4P) server that can be downloaded from the link inetprivacy.com/ftp/a4proxy.exe and installed in your PC. While you browse the Net (after installing the program and making the necessary configuration adjustments in the browser), instead of asking directly the target site's server, your request goes to this program installed in your machine and it sends the request to a proxy server (selected from the list of proxy servers available in its database). The proxy server processes the request, transmits the web page to the local proxy program, which in turn passes on the web page to your browser.

As already mentioned, to make use of this program you need to configure the browser so that it contacts the A4P server installed in your machine whenever a user sends a web page request (instead of directly sending the request to the server concerned). For details, please go through the program documentation before using it and make sure that you know what you are doing. If you are not comfortable with a program of this kind and still want to make an invisible web travel, try out some of the web-based services (discussed/mentioned below) created for this purpose.

Safeweb

If you are concerned about your privacy and do not want to disclose any information regarding your identity, browse through the free service SafeWeb available at safeweb.com. To use the service you need not download any software; just connect to the service, type in the address of the web site you want to visit in the SafeWeb's address bar and then press the 'Go' button. What happens here is that instead of accessing the target site directly, you get into it through the SafeWeb service; the target site will send the requested web page to the SafeWeb, which later on transfers it to your browser. This allows you to get the needed information from a site without disclosing your identity and no one can see what you are viewing! When you start using the site, the service opens another window and presents its interface along with your target site. In the new window you will see the default address bar turned off and is replaced by the

SafeWeb's address bar.

Some countries/organisations block their citizens/employees from accessing certain sites and having realised that SafeWeb can be used to circumvent this block, some organisations have put SafeWeb also among the list of undesirable sites to be blocked. To get around this problem, the SafeWeb has come out with a utility named the 'Triangle Boy'. Once this software is installed in your machine, you can connect to another machine that also has got 'Triangle Boy' installed and through this machine you can access the SafeWeb service. Please note that the author has not tested this service. This can be a threat to certain authentic/legitimate blocking of sites such as by the schools that want to prevent their students from accessing sites with undesirable content.

There are many other web-based services that let you access the Net in an anonymous fashion. Some of them are: anonymizer.com; aixs.net; and nethush.com.

Visual E-mail notifier

We have seen many e-mail notification tools in this column and here is one more! Visualmail is a feature-rich e-mail client that helps you check several numbers of e-mail accounts and notifies you the arrival of mails automatically.

The program displays the total number of messages lying in your e-mail servers spread across the Net in the program's system tray icon. Once you get the message that a few mails have arrived in your mail box (boxes), just click at the system tray icon and immediately you will get a preview of the details regarding the messages lying in the server.

That is, you will get an idea of the messages without downloading them and as the program supports necessary message management tools (like deleting a message), you can easily eliminate unwanted messages without allowing them to be downloaded to your machine. This free program can be down-loaded from the site:

visualmail.jpsoft.dk/vmail2.php.

J. Murali

(The author can be contacted at: murali27@satyam.net.in)

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Section  : Science & Tech
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