I'm a tech-head and may be confusing some of you. Here's an informative post that Emily from a post found on "Our Paradise Island" that may explain it better than I generally do:
Hide IP Next Generation
Most of the apps that hide you IP really only hide it from you. Even in the old days, you couldn't 'spoof' your IP address, no matter how great a hacker you were. Why? Because the server (which has pages that you load) has to send the packets (binary information) somewhere or you wont see the page loading or any pages at all. If you give a fake IP address, then nothing is going to load in your browser cause the server is sending its packets to the fake IP address and not your True IP address. So, how can you accomplish hiding you IP or what is known as anonymous web surfing? Well, it depends on who you are trying to fool.
Remember, the packets have to have somewhere to go, some browser to load. You can send the packets to your True IP or you can use what is called a Proxy Server, that is, a server that will go to the site instead of you, and relay the packets to your true IP address, so the pages will load. But there are different types of proxy servers. An understanding of what kind of proxy servers are available and what they do will better help you understand if you are truly surfing anonymous. There are 3 different classes of proxy servers in cyber space.
1) Transparant Proxy: In cyber space, shaking hands is done quite a bit. Especially when one server meets another. The first thing done is hand shaking. And a transparent proxy will shake hands with the server and say basically, "Hello, I'm a proxy server for WhiteKnight, his ISP is Metrocast and his IP address is 123.456.789.000." Plus other details are revealed, like what browser you are using (tells the server how to display the page) what operating system is being used, not everyone uses Windows, BTW. And other details are always given out. The advantage of an Invisible proxy server is that most of the time they are fast and wont slow down your surfing. The huge disadvantage is that you are hiding nothing and can fool really no one. A Transparent proxy tells all and shows all. Why would someone use one? Well they are fast and they probably don't know the difference between proxy servers
2) Next in the list is called Anonymous proxy servers. Like the others they shake hands with the server and merely say, "Hello, I'm a proxy server." and that is about it. An anonymous proxy wont tell the server who it is a proxy for or what the True IP address is (but SySAdmins have tools at their disposal to find out just about anything on your machine, depending on how ethical the SysAdmin is). Ever heard of web bugs and web worms? I will discuss what an Administrator can do later, but now, let us continue with the last class of Proxy servers.
3) 3ed is called High Anonymous (and sometimes called elite anonymous, but be careful here, sometime an elite could be a cross between a High Anon and an Anonymous. Using the examples above, all a High Anon will do with a server is shake hands. It won't tell the server that it is a proxy and it wont reveal to the server your True IP address. Just shaking hands is all your browser does when it tries to load a page on a server. So, in effect, a High Anonymous server acts more like a regular IE or Firefox browser than a proxy. It is a true attempt at fooling the serve about the IP address and who is loading the pages on that server.
Enter stage left: Software like Hide IP Next Generation. The most important thing that piece of software can do is find proxy servers for you and test them to see if 1) if they are still active and 2) how fast they are. A transparent proxy will zip, quick like a bunny, from site to site, cause it isn't trying to hide anything from the server. Anonymous servers are slower, cause most servers have security protocol in place that will question an Anonymous server on things like, well, if you are proxy, then who are your serving? In the Knights opinion, I haven't found a Hide IP program that is worth its salt.
Sure they can find proxy's for you, but they have a hard time testing them. Most Anonymous Surfing software can rarely find High Anon proxy's that aren't slower than granny going upstairs with a broken legs. The ones that they do find is put into the rotation, and there is no way of testing them, if they die and are no longer working (so you could be waiting for a week and a half (over stated, but most will know what I mean) for a page to load). When you do find a good working High Anon proxy, you will find that just about everyone else has found it as well. The Knight can't tell you the number of time he has found a simi-fast High Anon proxy and went to RapidShare to download a file (trying to get by the time limitations) only to have RapidShare say that the IP address is already in use.
With the years that the Knight has had in computer security, he can tell you that there is absolutely nothing you can do on a computer that can't be traced right back to the chair you are sitting in while you do it. All servers keep logs, even the proxy servers. Some bend to government demands while other wont. But in the end, it is he surfer who is taking the chance. Just ask Peter Townsend of The Who about Kiddie Porn and how they busted him.
Now, let us talk about who is fooling who, when it comes to proxy servers. In the old days, they didn't have codes like JAVA. JAVA is a sweet code and it has advanced the web, web deployment and web interaction farther than any other codes. Most SysAdmins use JAVA and they wont let you load their pages unless you have JAVA enabled. Why? Cause they wont have to take your IP address from some stinking proxy, they can take it right off your machine, so proxy away, if you think it will make any difference. Web bugs and web worms are products of JAVA script and can be employed and deployed in a variety of ways. Most are used for security reason, but whose security are we talking about, hmm? All of use have seen what is known as 'mouse traps' on web pages, yes?
A 'mouse trap' is where the page makers disable functions of your mouse, like right click will be disabled, or there is no 'back button' on the page. But all this can be filtered away, if you know how. If you want to surf as anonymous as you can these days. Plus, if you want to filter out all the codes that disable you from doing and using all the functions of your mouse,and fool a webmaster the best you can now-a-day, then get and learn how to use Proxomitron
Code:
http://homepage.usask.ca/~ijm451/prox/It is the best web filter the Knight has found out in cyber space. It has a feature that will allow you to test proxy servers not only to see how fast they are, but if they are truly high anon.
But just remember what has already been said: there's nothing you can do on the net that can't be traced back to you. A lot of it will depend on how hard they want to try and trace you. Mostly, law enforcement will gather low hanging fruit before they go after someone savvy enough to employ a web filter that will send the investigators all over hell and half the known world.