Install my own proxy

Question

My school network has blocked a lot of webpages, including TeamViewer, which I need. The IT department told me to find a proxy, because it was their ISP who had blocked the sites. To connect to the internet all the school computers are set up like this: http://screencast.com/t/AQehWSxRk2N (I have scrolled the URL to the right.)

I have tried http://www.hidemyass.com/ and TORProject and everything, but they don't work. (They do work at home though.)

Do anyone know how to work this out. Maybe to set up my own proxy-server on my computer at home? I tried to find out how to do this once, but I didn't seem to find an easy solution as to how to make a proxy-server. (preferably with a password.)

Thanks! :D

Answer 1

Assuming your home computer is internet-reachable, the easiest thing to do is run an SSH server on your home computer. Then connect to it from your school computer via:

ssh -D 8080 user@home

Then you can set SOCKS proxy of your browser at school to use localhost:8080 and everything will be proxied through the SSH tunnel to home.

There are some issues you'll have to work out:

• make sure the port you're going to use isn't firewalled at your school
• make sure your home sshd is set up as securely as possible (no root login allowed, disallow password logins, etc)
• unless you have a static IP at home, the home computer will need to integrate with a dynamic DNS service so that you know how to reach it

Answer 2

You better force this with unblocked proxy, because your teacher might block your home computer in the future.

Do you check other than hidemyass proxy?

• anonet2.biz/Open%20Proxies
• proxy.org/cgi_proxies.shtml

Read this page about Tor Bridges. If you have an email box inside the school network, you can get new bridge by email, 3 IP addresses per ask.

Understanding bridges

As an example, you'll get a bridge entry that looks like the following:

bridge 141.201.27.48:443 4352e58420e68f5e40bf7c74faddccd9d1349413

The first element is the IP address: '141.201.27.48'

The second element is the port: '443'

The third element, the fingerprint, is optional: '4352e58420e68f5e40bf7c74faddccd9d1349413'

In this scenario, Tor will connect to this bridges. This is developed specially against restricted firewalls.

See also: https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/BlockingDiagnostics

Answer 3

For my part, I bypassed my corporate proxy with a linux server, listening on port 443 (HTTPS) and I configured Bitvise to redirect my calls to my server through the proxy.

For setting up a Windows SSL server, I found that:

• http://inside.mines.edu/~gmurray/HowTo/sshNotes.html

To make SSH listening on 443 port, it depends on what SSH implementation you installed on your private computer, but, if you install it through Cygwin, you have to search for sshd_config file, find the line #Port 22, remove the # and change 22 by 443.

On your school's computer's side, you can check for Bitvise as a portable app (you can call it from a USB key - no installation necessary) :

• http://tp.vbap.com.au/

To configure Bitvise, I assume this website is okay (I cannot check it now):

• www.sshour.com/how-to-connect-to-ssh-tunnel-with-bitvise-ssh-client.html

But, you just have to fill the "proxy settings" by the proxy adress and port you will find in "Internet Options". This will only work if the firewall is weak - without any verification of the actual header of the frames. Indeed, the header will prove that you are trying to connect using SSL on HTTPS port.