An anonymous proxy server (sometimes called a web proxy) generally attempts to anonymize web surfing. There are different varieties of anonymizers. One of the more common variations is the open proxy. Because they are typically difficult to track, open proxies are especially useful to those seeking online anonymity, from political dissidents to computer criminals. Some users are merely interested in anonymity for added security, hiding their identities from potentially malicious websites for instance, or on principle, to facilitate constitutional human rights of freedom of speech, for instance. The server receives requests from the anonymizing proxy server, and thus does not receive information about the end user's address. However, the requests are not anonymous to the anonymizing proxy server, and so a degree of trust is present between the proxy server and the user.
Compared to anonymous proxy servers, the normal proxy servers, will not hide your real IP address. But they can still be useful for e.g. to gain speed when browsing the Internet. The following proxy servers are checked every day for their uptime. Most of these servers are up and running and they work perfectly.