A proxy acts as an intermediary between your computer and the internet, which assigns all your web requests a new IP address.
What is a Mobile Proxy?
A proxy server that assigns your computer a mobile IP address is said to be a mobile proxy. A second definition is that a mobile proxy is an intermediary that happens to be a mobile device. Thus, a mobile proxy routes web requests through a mobile device. By routing web traffic through mobile devices, mobile proxies are essentially assigning mobile IP addresses. In this regard, the two definitions are technically the same.
Benefits of Mobile Proxies for Businesses
With mobile proxies, you can achieve the following:
- Ad verification
- Protection against cyber attacks
- Web crawling
- Web scraping and other forms of market research
- Blocking cookies
- Price comparison, etc.
Mobile proxies are a must-have for businesses, primarily because they aid in web scraping. However, for their usage to be a success, given that websites make this form of data extraction difficult, you must choose a reputable mobile proxy provider. That said, here’s a list of 5 reasons why your business needs mobile proxies.
5 Reasons why Companies should use Mobile Proxies for Web Scraping
Genuine IP addresses
Good mobile proxy providers route the traffic through smartphones and tablets that are used by real users, a fact that makes mobile proxies authentic and genuine. Therefore, at no one time will a website flag your mobile IP address on suspicion of being a bot.
Reliability
Given that the mobile proxies’ IP addresses are from mobile devices being used by real users, in real-time, websites never detect any foul play. They assume that all requests from your computer emanate from the mobile phone, modem, or portable router whose IP address the mobile proxy has assigned your web requests. As such, mobile IP address and, by extension, mobile proxies aren’t blacklisted or banned. This underscores their reliability.
Seamless Browsing Experience
Have you ever encountered CAPTCHAs and noted how frustrating they are? Have you solved one CAPTCHA, but Google still went ahead and displayed another CAPTCHA for you to solve? This is a familiar narrative, especially when web scraping. It’s also the case when you’re browsing using a shared IP address. In such a scenario, websites such as Google receive too many web requests from the same IP address.
With mobile proxies, CAPTCHAs are a thing of the past since they mask the original IP address – which Google frequently flags – and assign you a new IP address. In fact, mobile proxies rotate the IP address after a short period because mobile network operators (MNOs), whose operations mobile proxies rely on, change IP addresses for connected mobile devices frequently. These factors make mobile proxies perfect for web scraping.
High Anonymity, Privacy, and Security Levels
The fact that mobile proxies change your IP address after a short period implies that you’ll keep receiving a new online identity for as long as you keep paying for the service. In this regard, the anonymity, privacy, and security that accompany using mobile proxies are unmatched.
Coincidentally, web scraping thrives under these three parameters. In this regard, mobile proxies are perfect for web scraping applications.
Optimized/Fast Connections
Mobile proxy providers focus on optimizing connections through fast cache storage. The result is that your computer will not store some unimportant data, thereby freeing your device. This results in increased performance. Mobile proxies usually optimize the connection when you’re browsing websites whose servers are located in foreign countries.
Mobile proxies also increase the connection speeds by eliminating websites’ requirements that your computer should store cookies. Cookies are packets of data that are stored in the device you’re using to browse the internet. The information stored therein makes it easy for trackers to know your location and any other personal data attached to the browser. Also, the storage of cookies slows down the device.
In this regard, you can rest assured that you’ll always experience fast connection speeds when attempting to extract data from websites using mobile proxies, regardless of the webservers’ locations.
How Mobile Proxy Help in Achieving Business Goals
The evolution of technology, increased use of the internet, and the subsequent shift of companies’ operations to online-based make the internet a hub of information. The need for competitive intelligence among competing factions and the availability of this same information online has necessitated large-scale web scraping. However, successful web scraping is dependent on having a proxy server and a reliable one at that. The 5 reasons above detail why mobile proxies are perfect for web scraping.
Mobile proxies are guaranteed to help companies achieve their business goals because they’re a prerequisite to successful web scraping. By extracting data from your competitors’ websites and even news outlets, you can realign your company’s operations to stay ahead of your competition. The realignment will then translate to increased revenue and higher profit margins.
