| Privoxy | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Developer | Privoxy Developers |
| Initial release | 2001 |
| Stable release | 4.1.0[1]  (5 January 2026; 44 days ago (5 January 2026)) [±] |
| Preview release | 3.0.25 (July 26, 2016; 9 years ago (2016-07-26)) [±] |
| Written in | C |
| Type | Filteringproxy |
| License | GNU GPLv2 |
| Website | www |
| Repository | sourceforge |
Privoxy is a free non-cachingweb proxy with filtering capabilities for enhancing privacy, manipulating cookies and modifyingweb page data andHTTP headers before the page is rendered by the browser. Privoxy is a "privacy enhancing proxy", filtering web pages and removing advertisements. Privoxy can be customized by users, for both stand-alone systems and multi-user networks.[2] Privoxy can be chained to other proxies and is frequently used in combination withSquid among others and can be used to bypassInternet censorship.[3]
Privoxy is based on theInternet Junkbuster and is released under theGNU General Public License. It runs onLinux,OpenWrt,DD-WRT,Windows,macOS,OS/2,AmigaOS,BeOS, and most flavors ofUnix. Almost any Web browser can use it. The software is hosted atSourceForge.[4] Historically the Tor Project bundled Privoxy withTor but this was discontinued in 2010 as they pushed their own internalTor Browser project and recommended against external third party proxies. Privoxy still works if manually configured and is still recommended for third party non-browser applications which do not natively supportSOCKS.[5]
Shashank Sharma ofLinux Format rated it 9/10 stars and wrote, "Privoxy is highly customisable, easy to set up, has good documentation and is fun to work with. Use it!"[6] Erez Zukerman ofPC World rated it 4/5 stars and called it complicated but powerful.[7] Michelle Delio ofWired called it "an outstanding way to protect one's privacy".[8]
