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Every passing day the world is becoming a different place. Likewise, technology and the Internet are changing with a fast pace.

Ten years ago Facebook was still a start-up, Twitter was a few months old, Uber and AirBnb didn’t even exits. Today these companies are shaping our human interactions and are changing industries.

In the last ten years, companies understood that private proxies and VPNs can be used in a broader sense. Initially, these anonymity tools were used by corporations to secure a safe line over the Internet to communicate. But that was in the old days when most of the business was still conducted off-line.

With the migration of most businesses to the on-line arena and the shift of consumers towards the on-line e-commerce, anonymity tools started getting more attention. Also their use started broadening.

In the last ten years there were a few events and shifts that shaped the way companies and consumers are using anonymity tools such as private proxies and VPNs. Today, these tools are used in a more broader way then they were used a decade ago.

PRIVATE PROXIES FOR FILTERING MARKETING NOISE

The amount of content created today is staggering. There is blog content, video content, social media content. How can marketers stay relevant in this flooded landscape?

While most marketers are struggling to make their social media campaigns relevant, other marketers are using anonymity tools, such as social media proxies to bring superior ROI.

While anonymity tools where initially used for communications between a company’s remote offices, today they are also used by marketers.

Marketers use social media proxies in different fashion. It all depends on their customer needs. Some are using these tools for research and A/B testing, while others are using them for growth hacking and expanding the consumer base.

ANONYMITY TOOLS ARE STILL USED FOR PRIVACY AND SECURITY

The major benefit that anonymity brings is security. This is why most Internet giants tend to keep their servers address secret.

With the migration of business communications towards online and email, companies dealing with sensitive information had to change strategy and use private proxies and VPNs to communicate with business partners.

In logistics, companies are using private proxies to hide their real online address in order to keep the sensitive information about the freight their carrying. In the past the communication was done mostly by phone between partner companies. But today the communication is done via email or other communication tools via the Internet.

At the same time, investment companies are communicating with their private data centres and stock exchanges through proxies and VPNs. The communication is conducted in this way due to the value of the information.

One counter-example, where security failed is the hack of the Bicoin exchange Bitfinex at the beginning of August 2016. More than $60 million were stolen by hackers and the exchange website and trading facilities are still down at the moment of this writing. This is a counter-example, because the lack of using private proxies led to the identification of the physical servers of the exchange. Thus the hackers had time to thinker on how to crack the ‘vault’.

PRIVATE PROXIES ARE HELPING THE WORLD FROM ENCLOSING FURTHER

In the last ten years, technology changed the way people communicate with each other. In the early 2000s, the only way people received information was primarily through mass media. After 2010, with the advent of social media, everything changed. Today people have the choice from where to consume information and news.

Because of the Arab spring in 2011 and social media rise, more countries are cracking down on freedom of speech then ten years ago. And with the enforcement of the Chinese Great Firewall, journalist all over the world are in need of privacy tools for protection and freedom.

The use of private proxies and VPNs in journalism culminated with the release of the ICIJ’s Panama Papers. A coordinated investigative effort to expose the dealings of offshore tax heavens and the involvement of public figures.

Without privacy tools such as VPNs, the workings of International Consortium of Investigative Journalist would have been limited.

Also, during the July 2016 failed coup in Turkey, major social media platforms were temporary restricted. In such times of upheaval, limiting information can lead to disinformation, manipulation and even atrocities. Even now, within weeks since the event, the number of victims is still unknown.

The few foreign journalists located in Turkey at that time, managed to communicate and dispatch news and information by using private proxies.

A WORD FOR THE YEARS TO COME

The last ten years saw majors shifts in consumers and business behavior. A bigger part of the economy migrated towards the Internet.

Marketers understood that to stay relevant, they need to cut through the noise and have a direct reach to the consumer. The way private proxies and social media proxies can be used by marketers is limited only to their imagination.

Companies used and will continue to use anonymity tools to stay anonymous in order to protect their data centers. Major hacking attacks, such as MtGox, SONY Pictures and Bitfinex, demonstrated that companies need to use any tool available to make data tracing back to their servers almost impossible

Privacy tools play also a humanitarian role. Ever since the Arab spring, journalists and people from all over the world can choose from where to consume information. This fact led to a complete destruction of media monopolies in totalitarian or semi totalitarian states. States such as Turkey and China are limiting the use of Western social media platforms. People from all over the world can access free information and news by using private proxies.