Public Proxies: Why They Are Dangerous for Business and What Safe Alternatives Exist

Public proxies attract attention due to their availability — they can be found for free in the public domain. However, this "free" service can cost you your Facebook Ads accounts worth tens of thousands of rubles, client data leaks, or computer infections with viruses. In this article, we will discuss the real risks of public proxies and show how to protect your business when working with multi-accounting, traffic arbitrage, and social media management.

What are public proxies and where do they come from

Public (or free) proxies are proxy servers available to any user without registration or payment. Their IP addresses and ports are published openly on special aggregator sites, forums, or in Telegram channels. It is enough to copy the server address and paste it into the settings of your browser or anti-detect programs like Dolphin Anty or AdsPower.

Where do these proxies come from? There are several sources:

• Hacked devices: computers, routers, and IoT devices infected with viruses become proxy servers without the owners' knowledge.
• Misconfigured servers: administrators mistakenly leave proxies open to everyone.
• Data collection bait: attackers intentionally create "free" proxies to intercept user traffic.
• Leftovers from paid services: sometimes these are IP addresses that were previously available for a fee but later ended up on blacklists and became useless.

It is important to understand: if a proxy is free and public, its owner is profiting in another way — most often at the expense of your data or by using your traffic for their purposes.

Main risks of using public proxies

Using public proxies for business tasks carries numerous risks that can lead to significant financial losses. Let's examine the main threats in detail.

Interception of confidential data

A public proxy server sees all your traffic. If you are working through an HTTP proxy (not HTTPS), the server owner can read everything you send: usernames, passwords, cookies, message content. Even if the site uses HTTPS, an attacker may attempt a Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) attack and decrypt the traffic.

What specifically can be stolen:

• Passwords for Facebook Ads, TikTok Ads, Google Ads accounts
• Cookies and authorization tokens — these can be used to log into an account without a password
• Credit card data when replenishing advertising budgets
• API keys from automation services
• Correspondence with clients in Instagram Direct or Telegram
• Access to control panels on marketplaces (Wildberries, Ozon, Avito)

Infection with malware

The owner of a public proxy can modify the traffic passing through it — injecting malicious scripts into web pages, replacing downloaded files with infected versions, displaying phishing forms instead of legitimate login pages. This way, your computer can be infected with viruses, ransomware, or cryptocurrency mining software.

Use of your IP for illegal purposes

Some public proxies work in reverse: they not only pass your traffic but also use your connection for their purposes. Through your IP, they can send spam, conduct DDoS attacks, or hack other systems. As a result, your real IP address ends up on blacklists, and you encounter problems accessing legitimate services.

Data interception: how accounts and money are lost

Let's look at specific scenarios where the use of public proxies leads to real losses.

Scenario 1: Loss of a Facebook Ads account

An arbitrageur launches an advertising campaign in Facebook Ads through a public proxy. During the process, he enters his login and password for his advertising account and links a credit card for ad payments. The proxy owner intercepts this data.

A few days later, the arbitrageur discovers that:

• The advertising budget of $5000 was spent on someone else's campaigns
• The account was blocked for suspicious activity
• Additional funds were withdrawn from the linked card
• All associated accounts were subjected to chain bans (cascading blocks)

Total losses: from $5000 to $15000 depending on the scale of the business, plus the inability to quickly restore operations due to blocks.

Scenario 2: Theft of a client base from an SMM agency

An SMM specialist manages 30 Instagram accounts for different clients through the anti-detect browser Dolphin Anty with public proxies. All accounts are authorized in one system, and cookies pass through the proxy server.

An attacker intercepts the sessions and gains access to all 30 accounts simultaneously. As a result:

• Spam or phishing links are published from all accounts
• Accounts are blocked by Instagram for violating rules
• Clients lose audience and reputation
• The SMM agency faces lawsuits and loss of all clients

Damage: loss of reputation, contract termination worth hundreds of thousands of rubles, legal costs.

Scenario 3: Compromise of marketplace accounts

A seller on Wildberries uses a public proxy to scrape competitor prices and manage multiple stores. Authorization data for the seller's personal account, which contains information about products, finances, and warehouse addresses, passes through the proxy.

Consequences of the leak:

• Competitors gain access to your pricing strategy and suppliers
• Attackers can change product descriptions, prices, and stock levels
• There is a possibility of funds being stolen from the seller's account
• The account may be blocked by the marketplace for suspicious activity

Real cases of losses in arbitrage and SMM

Let's look at several real (generalized) stories from the practices of arbitrageurs and SMM specialists who used public proxies.

Case 1: An arbitrage team and a loss of $12000

A small team of arbitrageurs decided to save on proxies when launching test campaigns in Facebook Ads. They used a list of free HTTP proxies from a public source. Over two weeks of work, they created 15 advertising accounts and spent about $8000 on advertising.

By the third week, all accounts were blocked simultaneously. Upon analysis, it turned out that all of them were accessing from IP addresses that were already blacklisted by Facebook for spam and fraud. Additionally, it was found that $4000 had been charged from one of the linked cards for someone else's advertising campaigns — the attacker intercepted the card data through the public proxy.

Total damage: $12000 (lost budget + stolen funds) + 2 weeks of downtime + the need to create a new infrastructure from scratch.

Case 2: An SMM specialist lost 40 accounts overnight

A freelancer managed 40 Instagram accounts for small businesses. He used AdsPower with public SOCKS5 proxies found on a forum. Everything worked stably for three months until one night, posts with phishing links began to be published from all accounts.

It turned out that the proxy owner was collecting session tokens and sold a database of several thousand accounts to other attackers. By morning, 38 out of 40 accounts were blocked by Instagram, and the remaining two lost all their audience due to mass unsubscribes.

Total damage: loss of all clients, reputational costs, inability to work in this niche for at least six months.

Case 3: Scraping Ozon led to the blocking of the main IP

A seller set up automatic scraping of competitor prices on Ozon through public proxies. The script operated from the office IP address, using proxies only for requests to Ozon. After a week, the main office IP was blacklisted by Ozon — it turned out that the public proxy was used for a DDoS attack on the marketplace, and Ozon blocked all associated IP addresses.

Total damage: inability to work with Ozon even from the main account, necessity to change the office IP address (negotiations with the provider, downtime for several days).

Technical problems: speed, availability, blocks

In addition to security threats, public proxies have serious technical limitations that make them unsuitable for professional work.

Low speed and instability

Public proxies are used by thousands of people simultaneously. The server's bandwidth is shared among all users, leading to:

• Low page loading speeds (10-50 Kb/s instead of normal 1-5 Mb/s)
• Frequent connection drops — the proxy can disconnect at any moment
• High ping (latency) — 500-2000 ms instead of normal 20-100 ms
• Inability to upload media files — videos for TikTok or images for Instagram may fail to upload

For arbitrage, this is critical: while you wait for the Facebook Ads Manager page to load, competitors have already launched their campaigns and captured the audience.

IP addresses on blacklists

Public proxies are widely used for spam, scraping, DDoS attacks, and other undesirable activities. Therefore, their IP addresses quickly end up on the blacklists of popular services:

Lack of control and support

When you use a public proxy, you have no guarantees:

• The proxy can stop working at any moment — the owner may simply turn off the server or change the password
• No technical support — if something doesn't work, there's nowhere to turn
• Cannot choose geolocation — you get a random country, often unsuitable for your tasks
• Cannot control quality — you don't know who else is using this IP and for what purposes

For business, this means unpredictability: you cannot plan operations if the tool can fail at any moment.

When public proxies can be used (rare cases)

Are there situations where the use of public proxies is acceptable? Yes, but such cases are very few and are not related to commercial activities.

One-time access to blocked content

If you need to view an article on a site blocked in your country just once, and you do not enter any personal data — a public proxy may be an acceptable solution. But even in this case:

• Do not enter usernames and passwords
• Do not use credit cards
• Do not open files downloaded through the proxy
• Use incognito mode in your browser

Testing site availability from another country

A web developer wants to check how their site looks to users from another country. A public proxy can be used for a quick check, but only if the site does not require authorization and does not process confidential data.

Training and experiments

A student is studying how proxy servers work and wants to test a connection. For educational purposes without transmitting real data, a public proxy will suffice.

Safe alternatives for business

For professional work with multi-accounting, traffic arbitrage, SMM, and e-commerce, there are reliable paid solutions. Let's discuss the main types of proxies and their applications.

Residential proxies — for working with social media and advertising

Residential proxies use IP addresses of real home users provided by internet service providers. For Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Google Ads, such IPs appear as regular users, minimizing the risk of blocks.

When to use:

• Launching advertising campaigns in Facebook Ads, TikTok Ads, Google Ads
• Managing multiple Instagram, TikTok, VK accounts
• Registering new accounts on social media
• Working with anti-detect browsers (Dolphin Anty, AdsPower, Multilogin)
• Warming up accounts before launching ads

Advantages: high trust from platforms, low percentage of blocks, ability to choose a specific country and city.

Mobile proxies — for maximum protection against bans

Mobile proxies operate through mobile operator networks (4G/5G). Their IP addresses change dynamically and are used simultaneously by many real users, making them virtually indistinguishable from regular mobile traffic.

When to use:

• Working with "warm" Facebook Ads accounts with a large budget
• Restoring blocked Instagram accounts
• Mass actions on social media (likes, follows, comments)
• Working with TikTok — the platform is particularly sensitive to IP type
• Situations where maximum protection against chain bans is needed

Advantages: maximum trust from platforms, one IP is used by many real users (hard to ban), automatic IP rotation.

Datacenter proxies — for scraping and technical tasks

Datacenter proxies are hosted on servers in datacenters. They are faster and cheaper than residential proxies but are easier to identify as proxies. They are suitable for tasks where speed is more important than anonymity.

When to use:

• Scraping data from marketplaces (Wildberries, Ozon, AliExpress)
• Monitoring competitor prices
• SEO tasks: checking website positions in different regions
• Mass registration of accounts on forums, classifieds
• Working with API services where high speed is needed

Advantages: high speed (up to 1 Gbps), stability, low price, unlimited traffic.

Comparison of proxy types

How to choose proxies for your tasks

The choice of proxy type depends on your goals, budget, and level of risk. Here is a step-by-step algorithm for selection.

Step 1: Define your task

Ask yourself the following questions:

• Which platforms am I working with? (Facebook, Instagram, marketplaces, other sites)
• How critical is account blocking? (loss of $100 or $10000?)
• How many accounts do I plan to use simultaneously?
• Do I need a specific geolocation? (country, city)
• What volume of traffic will I generate?

Step 2: Choose the type of proxy based on the task

Step 3: Check the quality of the provider

Not all paid proxies are equally good. Before purchasing, check:

• Reviews from real users — look for them on specialized forums (for example, for arbitrageurs)
• Availability of a trial period — the ability to test the proxy before purchasing a large package
• Technical support — how quickly they respond, is there help with setup
• Size of the IP address pool — the larger, the better (less chance of overlaps with other users)
• Ability to choose geolocation — can you select a specific country or city
• Return policy — what if the proxies do not suit your task

Step 4: Properly configure the proxy

Even quality proxies won't help if they are not configured correctly. Basic rules:

• One account = one proxy — do not use one proxy for multiple Facebook or Instagram accounts
• Bind proxies to profiles in anti-detect browsers — in Dolphin Anty, AdsPower, Multilogin, create a separate profile for each proxy
• Do not change proxies without reason — frequent IP changes look suspicious to platforms
• Use proxies from the same country as the account — if the account is registered in the USA, use a US proxy
• Check for WebRTC and DNS leaks — your real IP should not leak through WebRTC

Step 5: Monitor proxy performance

Regularly check:

• Connection speed — if it drops, contact support
• Functionality — check daily that all proxies are active
• IP reputation — use IP checking services to see if they are on blacklists
• Block statistics — if accounts are being blocked more frequently, the problem may lie with the proxy

Conclusion

Public proxies pose a serious threat to any business involved in online activity. Data interception, account theft, virus infections, platform blocks — all these are real risks that can lead to losses of tens and hundreds of thousands of rubles. Saving 300-500 rubles a month on proxies can result in catastrophic consequences.

For professional work with traffic arbitrage, SMM, marketplace management, or any other tasks where security and stability are important, it is essential to use paid proxies from reliable providers. Residential proxies are suitable for working with social media and advertising platforms, mobile proxies provide maximum protection against bans, and datacenter proxies are optimal for scraping and technical tasks.

If you work with Facebook Ads, Instagram, TikTok, or other platforms where account blocking means losing business, we recommend starting with residential proxies — they provide the optimal balance between cost and security. For particularly valuable accounts with large budgets, consider mobile proxies, which virtually eliminate the risk of blocks.

Remember: your security and business stability are worth much more than the cost of quality proxies. Do not risk your accounts, client data, and reputation for the sake of illusory savings.