When your users go on the internet, they have to give provide bits of information to be authenticated by the protocols that make the web work; this makes it possible to advertise who your users are, where they are connecting from, and if your users are not careful, a lot more.  Some of the information that is  handed out freely is your user's IP (Internet Protocol) address, generally in the form of four sets of numbers separated by periods, the country your user's ISP is located in, often times the origination of your user's TCPIP stack, which tells someone if your user is  on a Mac, PC or Linux box, your user's browser type, and, because of browser caching for speedy access to previously hit sites, your usr's browser history.

If your user's computer doesn't have certain functions turned off, it can be even worse. For example, unblocking the port of Windows Messenger (not to be confused with MSN messenger) will get your user's computer spammed with a thousand little gray boxes that all need to be turned off. Some computers and their TCP/IP stacks support finger and ident, which can reveal your user's personal information online. Even innocuous web sites that ask you user's for registration information can have that information intercepted and passed around.

If you are concerned about handing out your user's personal information on the web, be aware that there are ways to surf the web anonymously. This cuts the

trail of breadcrumbs and bits that lead potential identity thieves back to your user. The first way to do this is to route through an anonymous proxy server; this replaces its IP address for your user's, making it harder to track your user's IP address – and with hiding your user's IP address, a lot of the foundation for needless information exchange gets removed.

The primary vendors in anonymous proxy servers are for-pay services; these offer a wider and mostly secure range of products. Most also have a free version for people to try the benefits out; this has a number of benefits to you and your user – you and your users get to see what a difference it makes – and for them, because they can tell you and your users about the benefits they would accrue with the paid service. The top vendors are ShadowSurf and Guardster. For both of them, your user logs on, and enters the URL (web address) your user want to go to. Given how internet search engines are willing to sell users search data to federal agencies, and police organizations – even foreign governments – it's better to be prepared than to rely on the anonymity of the herd. In this vein there is another service called Anonymizer, which is designed specifically to help internet users bypass government mandated censorship and filtering.

An anonymous proxy server won't fully protect the user against viruses and malware; it will make it harder for the user to get them by browsing the web, and a lot of what they do can also be done by adjusting your user's router settings and the Network Abstraction Layer. If you are concerned about people knowing what your users browse, though, an anonymous proxy server is a definite must.