What Does “Proxied” Mean?
In the context of computer networking, “proxied” generally refers to the process of forwarding requests between two entities, such as a client and a server, through an intermediate entity called a proxy.
A proxy is a server or software that sits between a client and a server and acts as an intermediary to facilitate communication between the two. When a client sends a request to a server through a proxy, the proxy receives the request and forwards it to the server on behalf of the client. The server responds to the request by sending its response back to the proxy, which in turn sends the response back to the client.
The term “proxied” is used to describe this process of forwarding requests through a proxy.
A web proxy, also known as a “forward proxy,” forwards requests from a client (e.g., a web browser) to the internet. A forward proxy is typically used to control access to the internet or to cache frequently accessed resources to reduce network traffic.
A “reverse proxy,” on the other hand, often sits between the internet and a web server or other service and forwards requests from the internet to that service. A reverse proxy is typically used to improve performance, enforce security policies, and provide load balancing and failover capabilities. Envoy Proxy is a popular proxy used for this purpose, especially in service meshes like Istio to mediate traffic between services or, as in the case of Envoy Gateway, at the ingress of a Kubernetes cluster to manage incoming traffic to backend services.
For more information, read our Learning Center article on Envoy Proxy