I recently came across a post on digg.com about using a proxy server to divert your web traffic at work. This article went on to discuss how to basically bypass you corporate network firewalls or whatever device filters internet traffic. It also claims that this leaves no trace or evidence of where you have been. While the last claim is true, there are still several issues why you shouldn’t attempt this at work. First off if you work for any type of place that has a half way decent IT dept there is some sort of policy in place. This policy states what is permitted and not permitted internet activity, and all employee's should have agreed and signed off on this. Now the IT dept has a responsibility to also block as best they can this un-allowed activity. Now if you can access something that may be un-allowed, you can still be held accountable. If you plan to view adult websites, download P2P, or just waste hours online with non-work related content you have issues. These are the only reasons you may want to attempt what’s described in the article. Now to the good stuff. The author fails to inform the public on simple thing. They want you to use a different port to connect via OpenSSh to your proxy. The OpenSSh traffic is encrypted except for the client server greeting. Your IT dept dept can configure their IDS to look for this traffic, and log such. Now if the policy you signed states that’s as un-allowed activity your done. Even so if your bypassing setup restrictions and they have proof, game over. Now who wants to risk their job and lively hood over web surfing. We all should have unrestricted high speed connections at home. Check out the article, sorry this was a long one.
Digg artile