# If you own a domain can you use it as a proxy server?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-own-a-domain-can-you-use-it-as-a-proxy-server/315077>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [August 1, 2005, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-own-a-domain-can-you-use-it-as-a-proxy-server/315077 "2005-08-01T03:36:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Thin\_Lizzy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9a140/32.png) [@Thin\_Lizzy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thin_Lizzy)\
**Post date:** [August 1, 2005, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-own-a-domain-can-you-use-it-as-a-proxy-server/315077/1 "2005-08-01T03:36:09Z")

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If you have a website with your own domain, can you use it as a proxy server?

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**Author:** ![ShortBus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2bfe46/32.png) [@ShortBus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShortBus)\
**Post date:** [August 1, 2005, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-own-a-domain-can-you-use-it-as-a-proxy-server/315077/2 "2005-08-01T04:07:06Z")

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Your question, in and of itself, makes no sense. Tell us what you’re trying to accomplish and maybe we can help.

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**Author:** ![larsenmtl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d78d45/32.png) [@larsenmtl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/larsenmtl)\
**Post date:** [August 1, 2005, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-own-a-domain-can-you-use-it-as-a-proxy-server/315077/3 "2005-08-01T04:10:19Z")

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Do you own the server where your website is hosted or is it rented space? The key here is the machine not the domain itself.

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**Author:** ![Thin\_Lizzy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9a140/32.png) [@Thin\_Lizzy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thin_Lizzy)\
**Post date:** [August 1, 2005, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-own-a-domain-can-you-use-it-as-a-proxy-server/315077/4 "2005-08-01T04:22:54Z")

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suppose I own the domain [www.abc.com](http://www.abc.com). I want to connect my home pc to [abc.com](http://abc.com) and use it as a proxy, so that any sites i visit show my IP as coming from [abc.com](http://abc.com) instead of my computers IP address.

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**Author:** ![spinky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@spinky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spinky)\
**Post date:** [August 1, 2005, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-own-a-domain-can-you-use-it-as-a-proxy-server/315077/5 "2005-08-01T06:15:12Z")

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You can do this, but there’s more to it than you seem to realize. You need a computer to run the proxy server on. If your web hosting provider will allow you to run proxy server software on their web server machine that is known as [www.abc.com](http://www.abc.com), then yes, you could do this. However, you’re not necessarily guaranteed that your IP will show up as coming from [www.abc.com](http://www.abc.com) in the logs of sites you visit, because there may be multiple things (e.g. [www.xyz.com](http://www.xyz.com)) hosted on a single server, and the reverse name lookup from [www.abc.com](http://www.abc.com)’s IP address may actually come back as [www.xyz.com](http://www.xyz.com), or more likely, [webhost-123.yourhostingprovider.com](http://webhost-123.yourhostingprovider.com).