proxy gateway

networking A computer and associated software which will

pass on a request for a URL from a World-Wide Web

browser such as Mosaic to an outside server and return the

results. This provides clients that are sealed off from the

Internet a trusted agent that can access the Internet on

their behalf. Once the client is properly configured, its

user should not be aware of the proxy gateway.

A proxy gateway often runs on a firewall machine. Its main

purpose is to act as a barrier to the threat of crackers.

It may also be used to hide the IP addresses of the

computers inside the firewall from the Internet if they do

not use official registered network numbers.

Browsers such as Mosaic and Netscape can be configured to

use a different proxy or no proxy for each URL access method

(or "scheme") - FTP, Gopher, WAIS, news, and HTTP.

Mosaic and proxy gateways.

Compare proxy server.

(1997-06-08)