How SmartProxy can help you avoid geo-restrictions and protect your privacy

(Pocket-lint) – A proxy is a go-between server that shields your IP address and other aspects of your identity – and there’s no better way to use a proxy than with SmartProxy, a service with millions of proxies in every country and major city around the globe.

For Black Friday SmartProxy is offering a 33% discount for a Micro, Starter, or Regular plan. Each offers easy setup, over 40 million IPs, 195+ locations to choose from and 24-7 customer support. Each plan has its own traffic limit starting at 5GB for the Micro plan and rising to 50GB per month for the regular plan. Need more traffic? SmartProxy can give it to you.

Proxies are compatible with every major browser including Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Safari and Chrome. You can choose to use a proxy either on your device or through your browser itself. 

Why use a proxy

You can use a proxy for various key functions. Firstly, you can avoid geographical restrictions for some apps and services- particularly when accessing streaming content restricted to another country. You can ‘hide’ your IP address for this, but hiding your IP address also has other benefits such as increased security. Your IP address can reveal information about you, such as your physical location and who your ISP is. 

Proxy servers can also get around content blocks – such as those imposed by organisations like schools, universities and workplaces. If your school has banned Reddit, for example, connecting with a proxy means you can access it again. That’s because the firewall can’t detect where you’re heading as it can only see you are connecting the proxy IP address, not what sites you’re visiting and so on. 

Proxies can also be useful for situations where automated processes regularly check a site. With many such services, too many requests lead to you being banned. But because you can change your IP address with a proxy, you can get around the restrictions. This is also the case if you run websites – perhaps as a web marketing or SEO agency – where you need to scrape data from search engines or social profiles. Google and Facebook limit the number of requests from a single IP. Again that’s where proxy networks can help. 

Residential proxies

Residential IPs are private IP addresses, meaning that your requests will be routed through real desktop and mobile devices when accessing the web. SmartProxy has a vast residential IP network.

These are the highest quality of proxy since, as we said, they are genuine devices. You can select from millions of IP addresses from almost every country in the world. If you have a problem with a residential proxy you can simply move onto another on the same server. 

SmartProxy residential proxies are even used by sneakerheads to get hold of exclusive sneaker launches plus they’re also favoured by Instagram hustlers, too. 

Everything is designed to be easy to use and work seamlessly. After you’ve selected the proxy location – either random or a specific location of your choosing, you can select whether you want a sticky session (with the same IP throughout) or whether you want the IP to change (a rotating session). 

For pro clients: there’s a highly functional API, 24-7 live customer service via chat, no limit on concurrent connection requests, free advanced proxy rotation plus browser extensions and a proxy generator. SmartProxy also offers guides for every script imaginable.

As we mentioned, SmartProxy is offering a 33% discount for Black Friday at the moment, while there’s a three-day money-back guarantee, too.