Frequently Asked Questions

What's it do?

The Anti-Censorship Proxy is designed to defeat the site-blocking fuctionality of censorware and filtering-proxies. The user first visits a site running the Anti-Censorship-Proxy Server. Assuming this site is not blocked by the local filtering-proxy or censorware, the user is then free to browse any other web sites free of filtering-proxy or censorware restrictions.

This program works by setting up a listening HTTP server on a high port. When a user visits the main page, they will be presented with a text box, where they can enter a URL they want to visit. All requests to the remote URL will be transparently redirected through the proxying HTTP server. No client reconfiguration is required.

I want to use the proxy to anonymously vandalize or defraud a remote site. Will the server protect my identity?

No. The proxy server sets the standard HTTP/1.1 Via: header, and includes the requester's hostname in the commend field. The requester's IP address is also appended to the X-Forwarded-For: header. Every transaction processed by the server may be logged, and can be presented to anyone bearing the appropriate legal paperwork or clear and convincing evidence that fraud or vandalism has taken place, at the proxy operator's discression.

Are there any known bugs?

Known Bugs:

• Meta redirects are not handled correctly.
• Java and JavaScript with hard-wired paths don't always work correctly, especially if the URL's in question are blocked by your filtering proxy.
• HTML code that isn't fully SGML compliant but works fine with the Netscape browser sometimes gets maimed by the AFPP parser. Sorry.
• Forms using GET are sometimes blocked by the filtering proxy because keywords in the query string result in the URL being blocked by the filtering proxy. Try to find a similar site that uses a POST form instead.
• Something POST/GET form or HTTP cookie related prevents Yahoo! mail from working correctly. Sorry.
• HTTP objects are not sent to you until they have been fully retrieved from the remote server. You'll notice this overhead more when downloading large files.
• FTP doesn't work right.

This thing is ALPHA. Since this represents only a few hours of hacking, a lot can be improved.

The logging / fork()ing mechanism has been fixed. Anti-Bess should be a whole order of magnitude faster now.

No guarantee, NO WARRANTY, no exceptions.

I reserve the right to deny service to anyone, at any time, for any reason, including none at all. This is a free service being provided for your personal use. Remember, AFPP is a privilage, not a right. Don't abuse it.

Questions about Anonymity:

Every aspect of the original HTTP request is passed through unchanged except that the user-agent is changed, the content-length is cleared, and keep-alive is disabled. Every aspect of the HTTP response is passed through unchanged, except that URL's are re-referenced wherever possible.

I do log all traffic that passes through the AFPP. Statistics about usage may be posted in the future. The logs are shared only with #978 and afpp developers. Special exceptions below:

Future versions will include measures to prevent playback and snooping.

• If you use this system to break the law, and the appropriate legal paperwork is presented to me.
• If your usage involve vandalizing other systems, crimes of hate, or denial of service, I will take special pleasure in sending logfile entries to the appropriate athorities.
• If you interfere with the continued availability of this system by using it for commercial purposes, reselling it, or denial of service attempts.

Note that I charge $50,000 per hour for resolving legal problems. If you use this system to break the law, and it causes me a hassle, you've given me permission to bill you for this service.