Globalization has been incredibly useful for businesses. The phenomenon has allowed companies to grow at accelerated rates. Small businesses can reach out to customers in any part of the world in seconds via communication technology.
Easy access to new markets has also increased competition. The widened global playground also brings in a lot of security, privacy, and high-level competition in marketing challenges. Additionally, the proliferation of the internet and internet-enabled devices has led to the emergence of the big data industry.
Data today empowers businesses and has become a critical decision-making factor for business leaders. There is, however, too much data on the market, and businesses require an organized, efficient, and cost-effective method of procuring this data. One tool that can easily handle the many rising challenges of the internet age for businesses is the residential proxy server.
What is a residential proxy server?
A proxy server, simply called a proxy, is an intermediary that stands between web browsers and the internet. The proxy server is designed to channel all traffic to and from a website via its server. This process keeps the Internet Protocol (IP) address of the computer hidden.
The websites receiving your computer’s queries or sending any information back will only view the residential proxy’s IP address instead. An IP address is a unique identifier for internet-enabled devices. It is a combination of numbers and spaces assigned to your device by an internet service provider (ISP).
The IP address can communicate personal information such as your location or your ISP. Fortunately, when a proxy server is in place, your IP address remains hidden. That ensures any entity tracking or monitoring your web activity cannot access your personal information.
The most common proxies out there are data center proxies. These proxy types are affordable and easy to access. They, however, do not have valid IP addresses. Any keen web administrator, hacker, or tracker can easily differentiate a data center proxy’s IP address from that of a residential one.
Residential proxies are sold by ISPs and are more expensive than data center proxies are. They nevertheless have valid IP addresses and are not as easily identifiable when in use online. Residential proxies are also more reliable than data center proxies are.
There are many advantages of residential proxies for businesses that require access to web data, security, and privacy online. These benefits include:
Benefits of residential proxies
Enabling privacy online
The Cybersecurity Ventures’ Annual Cybercrime Report, states that cybercrime brings losses of over $6 trillion every year by 2021. The report says that cybercrime is the greatest threat facing businesses today and is particularly costly for companies. Cybercriminals can cause massive destruction by stealing intellectual property, money, financial and personal data, or productivity.
Their activities can also cause reputational harm and disrupt the course of a business post-attack. Security experts say that one of the best ways to stay safe online is to curb exposure to identity theft and hacking. As an illustration identity, theft can happen when a criminal accesses personal data through deception or fraud.
Employees are highly prone to identity theft for economic gain. A criminal can access information such as account access if the data is unguarded. Social engineering criminals also mine personal data shared on public platforms to dig up answers to common security authentication questions.
A residential proxy server can minimize your business’s exposure to cybercrime by veiling your network’s IP addresses. Cybercriminals attempting to steal personal or business data will have a hard time accessing your database and employee data. That’s because there is no IP address to track. You can use residential proxies to block any harmful websites or to monitor internet usage in the office.
Enables data scraping
Due to the competitive nature of businesses, data harvesting has become a challenge. Most websites have anti-scraping measures in place to ensure that their data remains scrape free. Fortunately, residential proxy servers can access a website and allow data scraping without raising any suspicions.
A web scraper using a rotating pool of proxies will access the site and interchange the proxies in use to mimic organic traffic. The data harvested can enhance competitive pricing, SEO, and research strategies.
Content aggregation
Businesses that rely on leveraging big data for revenue generation, such as aggregator sites, need residential proxies to maintain their databases. Aggregation sites collect data from multiple sources through web scraping, so their IP addresses are prone to banning.
Many websites have anti-bot features that block the aggregator bot’s requests. Residential proxies can bypass these blockages and keep the aggregator site’s database update with fresh data.
Brand protection
Unscrupulous online retailers of counterfeit branded items can cause a lot of revenue losses to a business. These brand abusers are challenging to apprehend since they place website access restrictions on IP addresses from regions where the real brand is located.
Residential proxies can bypass these restrictions and help bring all forms of brand abusers to justice. These proxies can also help monitor the web consistently to prevent any other cases of brand infringement.
Conclusion
Every business today needs ample data security and access to success. Use the best residential proxies for privacy, security, and data access.
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