Receptional_Andy - 11:14 pm on Apr 16, 2009 (gmt 0)

Again, not quite ;)

A proxy is just a client between your web browser and the server. And like any client, it can supply whatever data it likes to the server. This would only work with Google results if, when your browser requested www.google.com/url?something it sent another request to the actual search result destination. But that would be the equivalent of scraping the page of sites in search results, and browsers never leaving Google. Would Google even consider such an extreme measure?

Redirects are different - they send the client to a different URL.

Don't forget, what we're talking about here is the referrer as sent to sites that are clicked in search results. These are specified entirely by end-user's web browsers when they arrive at the search result destination. These browsers must visit the URL www.google.com/?url=something for that to appear in a referrer request header (unless end-users suddenly configure their browsers to spoof referrers. That URL can deliver whatever content it likes, though, of course.