Making my server into my proxy for personal use

[Asia_Expat]

I'm living in a country that is blocking numerous websites and a lot of other websites don't even ping unless I go through some kind of proxy. I am also unable to visit certain current affairs websites. Some websites are extremely slow, or simply hang during page load. It's becoming infuriating.

I would like to set up my server to use it as my own private proxy server but I have no idea how to do it. Could you please give me some pointers and tips?

Thanks.

[edited by: Asia_Expat at 1:07 pm (utc) on Jan. 15, 2008]

[lammert]

If you are using an Apache server, it is not difficult to do it. Apache has a proxy module which allows to use the server as a webserver and proxy server at the same time. I use the proxy module on my main server for some specific tasks including browsing to Google to see the real US www.google.com SERPs.

The setup for the proxy module differs between Apache versions. You should read the manual to decide which settings are for your specific situation.

WARNING!
Once you have setup and started the proxy module of your server, it will be available by everyone! You have to disallow access for everyone, except for the IP address you use. It may also be worth setting up HTTP authentication, although I didn't test the Apache authentication module in combination with proxy serving.