If you want to perform medium to large-scale scraping without dealing with IP bans, you’ve come to the right place. As you may already know, web scraping is linked to bans and blocks, making it almost impossible when not using the right tools.
These include good web scrapers and even better proxies. But how can proxies help here, and why are residential proxies known as the best option for this job?
There are so many questions regarding web scraping and proxies, but we’ll help you get the answers and understand the connection.
The goal is to learn why proxies should be an important part of your data extraction tasks and how to choose the best ones for minimal risk of bans.
So, What Are Proxies?
You can see them as a middleman between your device (such as a tablet, laptop, or PC) and the website you have in mind. They have unique IP addresses that function as yours when using them to connect to websites or any other web source.
Proxies take the requests you send to a website and modify them before they finally send them to the website servers. They do the same thing with web responses – as soon as the website sends a response, they take it on your behalf and send it to you.
This way, they provide online anonymity and privacy, which can be useful in many situations.
Types of Proxies
There are many different types of proxies, but we’ll focus on proxies based on their IP source. These include:
Datacenter proxies – have IPs sourced from data centers and cloud storages, hence the high speeds and risk for detection.
Residential proxies – have rotating IPs coming from genuine internet users and ISPs, hence the high reliability and trust score.
Mobile proxies – have IPs obtained from mobile devices connected to 5G/4G/3G/LTE mobile networks, hence the high anonymity and prices.
Why Are Proxies Important for Web Scraping?
The simple answer is that without proxies, your web scraping will most likely be interrupted by an IP ban. The question is, why?
Well, in order to scrape data from a website, you need to send hundreds of requests to its server. The problem is that all those requests come from a single IP address, which indicates a bot behavior. Since most websites, especially well-protected ones, have anti-bot techniques to recognize such behavior almost instantly, your IP address is doomed.
Once it gets banned from the website you wanted to get information from, you’ll no longer be able to scrape it. In fact, you won’t be able to access it, whether for a short amount of time or forever. This means you won’t have the data you need to make well-informed business decisions.
This is when proxies come to the rescue!
They allow you to send countless requests to a single website via different IP addresses. This way, they protect you from bans and blocks, ensuring efficient data scraping without interruptions.
Proxy services are extremely useful when collecting and extracting data from web sources. Some of the most important benefits of using scraping proxies include:
- Increased anonymity
- Lower risk of IP bans
- Improved performance
- Unrestricted access to websites
In a nutshell, if you want to do large to medium-scale scraping, you need to use good web scraping proxies!
What Are Residential Proxies?
Residential proxies are intermediary servers using IPs registered to real ISPs. They are sourced from actual residential devices such as PCs, laptops, and smartphones.
These proxies work by routing your web scraping requests through real residential connections. As a result, your web requests look like they come from actual online users and not a bot.
This way, they help you get around websites’ anti-scraping software so you can get the data you need without getting banned or blocked.
How Are Residential Proxies Different from Datacenter and Mobile Proxies
All three proxy types have IP addresses sourced from different places. Residential IPs come from real home internet users, datacenter IPs from data centers or cloud services, and mobile IPs from mobile users.
What does this mean?
First, it makes residential proxies more trustworthy than others, mimicking real user behavior. Although mobile proxies have high trust scores as well, residential ones are still less likely to trigger anti-scraping measures.
And second, it makes them slower than both mobile and datacenter proxy servers. That’s because they rely on the connections of home online users.
Another important difference is the number of IPs and locations available.
Residential proxy networks tend to be significantly larger than datacenter and mobile pools, comprising millions of IPs in hundreds of locations worldwide. Not only are datacenter and mobile networks smaller, but they also tend to cover fewer locations.
And when it comes to web scraping, the more IPs and locations, the lesser the risk of detection.
Let’s tackle pricing. Residential proxy servers are usually more expensive than datacenter proxies but cheaper than mobile IPs.
Are Residential Proxies Legal?
Whether residential proxy services are legal or not depends on proxy providers. Companies that use ethical IP sourcing methods and comply with the industry’s data protection and legal standards are considered safe options.
Of course, it also depends on how you use the proxies. Generally, if you use ethical and compliant residential proxies for cautious scraping and nothing illegal, you can perform your tasks with peace of mind.
What Are the Advantages of Using Residential Proxies for Web Scraping?
Here’s why you should consider using residential proxies for data scraping:
Protection against IP Blocks
Most anti-scraping techniques use IP banning to block repetitive requests from automation tools or bots. Once they notice too many requests related to one IP address, they start considering it suspicious, blocking it temporarily or forever.
With a residential proxy, the server uses a different IP address for each request, avoiding suspicions and blocks. That’s because residential proxies are naturally rotating, changing their IP addresses automatically after each request for maximum anonymity.
Enhanced Privacy
Residential proxy services provide you with a new IP address obtained from genuine users and ISPs, keeping your true online identity private. This way, you can perform scraping anonymously and maintain your IP’s reputation.
Improved Performance
A reliable proxy server can provide better performance when scraping. Instead of contacting the target server directly, it can cache data.
Access to Geo-restricted Content
If you want to gather data from websites unavailable in your country or region, residential proxies in a supported location can solve your problem.
They can also be helpful when you want to access content exclusive to a particular region because many websites show different content to people in different regions.
Choosing the Best Proxy Solution
Here are the most important factors to consider when choosing scraping proxies for you:
- Opt for residential proxies instead of other proxy types.
- Look for an extensive proxy network covering worldwide locations.
- Choose a proxy provider with ethical IP sourcing methods and compliance with the industry’s highest standards.
- Look for high-performance residential proxies with automatic rotation.
- Opt for proxies with high uptime for optimal reliability.
- Ensure the proxies support both HTTP/HTTPS and SOCKS5 protocols for seamless compatibility.
- Look for flexible plans and reasonable prices to avoid overpaying.
- Consider a provider with responsive, all-around customer support.
To Sum Up
Web scraping is invaluable in today’s business practices but also challenging. If you want to perform your data gathering tasks with minimal risk of IP bans, CAPTCHAs, and blocks, you should use high-quality proxies.
While there are many proxy types and providers out there, an ethical residential proxy pool with a high number of IPs, worldwide location support, advanced features, and reasonable prices will ensure efficient data scraping without interruptions or overpaying.
Top comments (0)