Is there a definitive program or method in determining the proxy server
addresses and port numbers of a given ISP?

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Request for Question Clarification by hummer-ga on 28 Oct 2002 13:44 PST

Dear puffins,

Are you just setting up your networking for the first time?  I would
suggest downloading SpoonProxy (free for two computers), which is
available at:

http://www.pi-soft.com/spoonproxy/

It includes a very nice "Mapping Service" which will automatically set
your ports and search for your ISP's address.

I'm not sure what you are trying to do, or what you are using, so I'm
hesitant to go any further than that. If I'm way off-base, please
provide more info - if this answers your question, let me know and
I'll post it as an answer.

Cheers,
hummer

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Clarification of Question by puffins-ga on 28 Oct 2002 14:33 PST

Hello hummer ~

Thanks for your request for clarification. However, wrong direction. I
already have a network setup. I am very familiar with SpoonProxy, a
very nice recommendation, however, not suitable nor desirable. It does
not have proxy caching capability. The closest to what I need (via
shareware) would be WinProxy 4.0. In any event, I prefer not to go the
software route. I prefer "real-world" networking ;) I am looking for
this specified proggie or method/command predominantly to improve my
speed. A local ISP proxy server with caching capability would
definitely improve my situation. No interest in anonymous, free,
transparent, etc. etc.......you know what I mean, I'm sure.

Your "forensic" help would be appreciated. Many thanks. Please feel
free to make contact with ANY questions or suggestions....both ears
open.

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Clarification of Question by puffins-ga on 29 Oct 2002 05:12 PST

Hello Mooncricket ~

Sorry, your "ultimate resolve" brought to mind the comical line: "Any
@#$%^ing idiot could understand that." -Einstein, 1938".  ;)

It does not provide the answer I seek. Firstly, already have a
Link-sys BEFSR41. Secondly and unfortunately, my question does not get
resolved by using the telephone. Again, I am in search of a definitive
program or method in determining the proxy server addresses and port
numbers of a given ISP.

Thank you for continued efforts. Very much still listenting.....

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Clarification of Question by puffins-ga on 30 Oct 2002 09:06 PST

Hello versusobj7 ~

Received this notification, however, nothing new appears posted.
Thought that you should know.
QUOTE:   
Hello,

In regard to question: proxy servers and port numbers
Question ID: 91127
URL: http://answers.google.com/answers/main?cmd=threadview&id=91127

A new comment has been posted to your question. END QUOTE

Hi Puffins,

Thanks for the clarification - however, I'll have to pass the ball to
someone else - I'm sure a more appropriate researcher will surface
(I'll check back later to be sure).

Good luck,
hummer

While your question is kind of vague as to what you are trying to
accomplish, I'll  offer; not all ISPs are going to have proxy servers,
in fact few will.  Additionally, the proxy cache may not hold the
files you are looking for.  While Google would make an awesome caching
proxy server, I think they may not have thought of this yet.  If you
want to cache http requests for your LAN, Smoothwall is a great
product ( http://www.smoothwall.org ) that is free.  I currently use
it to perform NAT for a DSL connection to an office on a subnet of my
LAN.  You'll need to revive a box from your boneyard and some NICs to
put it together.  You set the size of the cache (mine is 400Mb). 
Novell Border Manager is a good fully commercial product if you prefer
to spend money.

Hello bayerwerke ~

Wie ghet es ihnen?

Thanks for your suggestions. However, I must disagree with your
comment "not all ISPs are going to have proxy servers, in fact few
will." The proxy servers, for the most part, are there, in place and
are used for a myriad of services. They truly are an underutilized
resource.

I just need the mechanism to determine their addresses and #'s. I
would appreciate your further investigation of same, whether it be
$ware or freeware programs, special commands, etc.

Ich danke ihnen sehr.

Puffins

ok i offer you the ultimate resolve. you need to build a router or buy
one. this nothing more than a small computer with lan access and open
bsd as a program. you can do anything this way. as for your automatic
resolution to services, you need to contact each manufacturer an find
out what ports they are using. there is no difenitive answer to your
question

I don't see why people aren't understanding this guys problem.  He
doesn't wanna build a friggin router.  He wants to find something
already existing at his ISP.  So your looking to use something akin to
a port scanner.  LanGuard is an amazing scanner, just put in a range
of IPs and it can sometimes tell you all sorts of insane stuff about
the computers it finds.  On the other hand, sometimes it doesn't tell
you much at all.  But thats the best suggestion I can think of.  Of
course, you could always call and ask, Im sure they would appreciate
that more then a probe, which no doubt is against your TOS.  But at
the sametime, since running a local proxy would be infinately faster
and more efficient, I get the idea your up to no good in the first
place, so a phone call is probably not what you desire.  In any case,
good luck, and if your interested in that languard thinger, you can
pick it up at download.com, I highly recommend it.

There are two cases.

  1- Your ISP uses the proxy for your conection
  
     In this case you need a tracer program(there are too many and are
easy to find in hackers and lamers websites)  that let you know every
machine the connection goes thru until it gets to the destination,
including of course the proxy server (its funtionality is deeply based
on the TCP/IP protocol and the living time of the packet, if you need
more info contact me). To get the port number you'll need a port
scanner to run against the proxy IP that you got using the tracer.
Maybe your connection is stablished directly with the proxy server and
all you need to do is:

    netstat -a

     This command will let you know to whom you are connected directly
and the proxy will show up using a IP near of your IP since it belongs
to the same ISP provider, this will also show to wich port on the
proxy you are connecting to.

  2- Your ISP uses a proxy but not for your connection.

    Since every ISP has a IP range you should find out wich range they
are working with, this can be done scanning ranges of IP's near of
your own assigned IP or going to the whois databases where every ISP
must register the IP range they use. Then you will need to portscan
again every machine on the conmmon proxy ports:
   
    HTTP protocol-  80 - 3128 - 8080
    Socks 4 & 5 protocol -    1080

   Can get a little bit harder since maybe the ISP uses a customized
proxy port that makes harder the task because you will need to scan
every port checking for a right answer.

 please, tell me wich is your case to explain you the right variant.

Cheers

To Versusobj7 ~

Situation #2. Please be as detailed as possible. Sounds like we are on
the right track. Thank you.

Option #2

   Steps-

    1- Get the IP range of your ISP using one of the global databases,
a handy one could be http://ws.arin.net/  , the search page is
http://ws.arin.net/cgi-bin/whois.pl , type in yout IP address and it
will show up your IPS range of IP's.
     
    2- Get a  decent customizable portscanner for free- ShadowScan,
BlackHorse, anyone that let you change the port number to scan in a IP
range, try to download one for free using a P2P utility like KaZaa, if
you can't find one try researching at www.astalavista.com, if at the
end you didn't find none let me know.

    3-With the portscanner, type in the IP range and start scanning on
the most common proxy ports, there are mainly 2 protocols you may want
to use ( :

     - HTTP ( protocol specifications on 
http://www.w3.org/Protocols/) - This is the widely used protocol for
webpage retrieval, most HTTP proxys run on port 80, 3128,8080,8181.
Scan the whole IP range in those ports. ShadowScan port scanner checks
for multiple ports at the same time when scanning one IP range, others
just check on one port for the IP range and you must portscan several
times for every common port.

     - Socks 4 & 5 (protocol specifications on
http://www.socks.nec.com/socksprot.html)  - Proxys using this protocol
tend to use ports 1080, same procedure as on the HTTP protocol just
for port 1080.

   4- At this point maybe you got a running proxy on your ISP range,
but be careful, maybe another user like you has a non secured proxy
running for a hohe network and you finish using his proxy.Chances to
finish using someone else's proxy are huge.

   5- If you didn't find anything (this is hard to believe, proxys are
everywhere on the net) you should portscan the whole IP range checking
from port 80 to port 9999 for a customized proxy ( be careful, proxy
scanning in this way is mostly used by hackers searching for security
holes and exploits, this is also a don't do clause on most ISP's Terms
Of Service, but can be fun for the stuff you can find apart from,
proxys.... :-) ).

Reply back if I miss something.

Regards

Secured the IP ranges per your suggested URL. Downloaded ShadowScan
2.17 which is not freeware, but no problem ;). Using this (all
resource consuming) proggie, currently have the "PROXY SCANNER",
from...to.., going through the extensive IP listings, with only 1%
completed after 4 hours. Almost all of which read: 'cannot connect to
host', with 4 or 5 readings of 'error return code". This "proxy
searcher" reads the 80, 8080 and 3128; not the socks 1080. This will
probably take 24 hours+/-. Will use the port scanner next. Am I
approaching this correctly or should I have gone to 'port scanner'
firstly?

Your comment mentioned freeware, also mentioned using the port scanner
as being meaningful. Assuming this is the same program. No others with
same name came up in search. The program comes from
http://www.rsh.kiev.ua/, soon to be called safety-lab.com.

Your comments/suggestions appreciated. This issue is very meaningful
to me. Upon completion, your time will not go unrewarded. Thank you.

Step completions.

 1-Assuming you got the right IP range of your ISP this stp is
completed.

 2-The scanner is the right one, the russian ShadowScan,a professional
tool.

 3-Go directly into Proxy Scanning option, I didn't mention this
option since it is available just with ShadowScan. It has the default
most common proxy ports configured for this action. Keep checking the
whole IP range, don't worry about the "can't connect to host"
messages, every ISP has multiple dinamic assigned IP users and those
IP's are maybe the ones your are scanning right now.

 4-Let me think for an hour and feed me up with more details of the
ShadowScan version  you are using, the options you are running right
now ( can be proxy scanning,port scanning,IP scanning,etc...)

Regards
 
 Karel

Currently following your lead on using Proxy Scanner...IP Zone
(from...to). After 6 or so hours, it has only completed 3% of IPs. If
you wish, I can email you directly and provide the IP ranges, etc.
Doable?

I have to stop/go, periodically, because the program EATS system
resources...went from 59% to 19% before opening any other window. It
is 12:45AM on the east coast and I will have it run all night. I have
to get some sleep currently...been up 18+hours.

Aside from "can't connect to host", have seen other comments: "text
not found", "error return code." I tested one of these "errors" in IE
Lan settings and a userid/password box came up for every site I went
to.

Scanner Tabs:
IP Scanner
Port Scanner
Proxy Scanner
NetBios Scanner
Banner Scanner

The program also has Internet Tools: ping, tracert, telnet, Nslookup,
DNS Info, NetStat, Finger,Echo, Time UDP and WhoIs.

There is also a Site Info section to show servers but NO DETECT with
the exception of current IP address.

Awaiting further direction. Thanks.

Hello Karel ~

Completed 100% of proxy search ----nothing discovered.

~Puffins

Please check something....

 Somewhere into ShadowScan into the options there is a URL that the
program is going to check thru the proxy it is checking and a text
string that must appear in that URL. This URL change from version to
version of ShadowScan and not always is accurate or right. You should
change that URL and the text string.

 Example:

  URL        : ://www.google.com
 Text String : "Ask your question. Set your price."

 The text string must be used without quotes,is a piece of continuos
text that appears into the webpage the URL is pointing to.

 Example #2

 URL         : http://www.yahoo.com
 Text String : "Copyright © 2002 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved."

Again...Without quotes in the Text String. Forgot to tell you, most of
the time ShadowScan comes with a non valid URL pointing to the old
ShadowScan's website.

Check this out, if not,let's keep thinking if you want.

Cheers

Hi Karel ~

In Options is Policies, Ports, HTTP, Socks, etc 

Under the HTTP: 1) Proxy.............left unchecked. Asks for address
and port #
Multi Threads     
                2)HTTP Scan.............checked and gives choice...
what is selected is: cgi-bins. Also offers cgi-dos, cgi-win, scripts

However, what I believe you are referring to shows up under the Proxy
Scanner Tab, under the IP Host range request.

Correct in assuming that this is what you are referring to? Currently
reads.....

Test host:   http://www.rsh.kiev.ua/

Find Key Text:  ShadowScan

I will restart the scanning again from scratch using the example #1
you provided. Please advise if this is correct/incorrect. And yes,
"keep thinking."

Thank you. 

~Puffins

Hi Karel ~

Mid day update: Completed about 25-30% of proxy server scanning with
NEW url.....nothing new at all. Possibly premature, but doubt that
there will be; will continue with same. Socks not checked whatsoever.

Ready to listen to alternative strategies.........   ;) 

Thanks.

~Puffins

Let me think, meantime ,if possible,send me the scanning report, need to see it....


Regards