Web Scraping & Automation

When most people hear “web scraping,” they imagine an army of bots hammering websites for data. The narrative is usually:

• You buy a proxy list.
• You rotate IPs endlessly.
• You scrape at scale.
• You never get blocked.

But in reality? That’s rarely how it works.

Scraping is as much about system design as it is about proxies that work. And proxies, particularly datacenter ones, are widely misunderstood. Many blogs will tell you to “always use residential proxies” or “avoid datacenter because they’re detected.” That’s not just oversimplified. It’s often flat-out wrong.

The Datacenter Proxy Myth

Here’s the controversial truth:

👉 For most scraping and automation tasks, you don’t need residential IPs.

Datacenter proxies work for web scraping, they are:

• Faster (less latency, higher throughput)
• Cheaper (important when scaling to millions of requests)
• Sufficiently undetectable if paired with good session handling

The problem isn’t the proxy type. It’s the scraper design.

If your scraper triggers blocks, it’s not because your IP is “datacenter.” It’s usually because:

• You’re sending requests too fast.
• Your headers are identical across requests.
• You’re not simulating human behavior (scrolling, clicking, random delays).
• You’re ignoring the site’s crawl budget or robots.txt.

The Uncomfortable Legal & Ethical Side

Scraping is often painted in black and white: either “legal if it’s public data” or “illegal if against terms of service.” The truth? It’s a gray zone.

• LinkedIn vs hiQ (2019): A court ruled scraping public data isn’t a CFAA violation.
• But: Platforms still aggressively block scrapers.
• Reality check: Whether legal or not, your scraper will face friction.

What does this mean for developers? Proxies aren’t just technical. They’re your shield against platform-level enforcement. Using them responsibly matters as much as using them effectively.

The Real Battles in Scraping Aren’t About IPs

Most scraping failures don’t come from proxies. They come from detection layers:

1. Browser fingerprinting: Sites analyze canvas, WebGL, and font rendering to catch automation.
2. Headless browser flags: Selenium and Puppeteer leave behind subtle traces unless patched.
3. Behavioral detection: Bots click too fast, scroll unnaturally, or never pause.

A smart scraper treats proxies as just one layer of evasion. Proxies don’t make a bad scraper good. They make a good scraper scale.

A Practical Example: Why Sessions Fail

Imagine you’re scraping a login-protected dashboard. Most tutorials will suggest “rotate proxies every request.” But here’s the catch:

• If you switch IPs mid-session, you’ll trigger suspicious login warnings.
• If you stick to one IP but hammer 10,000 requests in 10 minutes, you’ll still get blocked.

The solution?

• Use sticky IPs for sessions.
• Use rotating IPs for bulk collection.
• Separate authentication layer from data collection layer.

Here’s a Python snippet showing poor vs good practice:

# ❌ Wrong: rotating proxy mid-session
for proxy in proxy_list:
    session = requests.Session()
    session.proxies = {"http": proxy, "https": proxy}
    session.get("https://example.com/dashboard")
    # Likely to trigger login warnings

# ✅ Better: sticky proxy for login, rotating for data
auth_proxy = "http://user:pass@proxy.proxiesthatwork.com:PORT"
data_proxies = [...]

auth_session = requests.Session()
auth_session.proxies = {"http": auth_proxy, "https": auth_proxy}

# Login with sticky IP
auth_session.post("https://example.com/login", data={"user": "test", "pass": "test"})

# Use rotating pool for data
for proxy in data_proxies:
    data_session = requests.Session()
    data_session.proxies = {"http": proxy, "https": proxy}
    response = data_session.get("https://example.com/data")
    print(response.status_code)

This nuance is rarely covered, but it’s where real-world scrapers either succeed or crumble.

The Future of Scraping: Less Bots, More Intelligence

We’re moving into an era where:

• Sites use AI-based anti-bot detection (not just IP bans).
• Scraping requires headless browsers + fingerprint spoofing.
• Proxies remain essential, but not sufficient on their own.

The real skill in 2025 isn’t “finding a proxy that works for scraping.”

It’s knowing how to integrate proxies into a resilient automation pipeline.

Where to Buy Proxies That Work for Web Scraping

Many “scraping proxy” providers charge a premium for features you don’t need or worse, sell recycled IPs already flagged by major sites.

If you want proxies that work for web scraping, make sure they’re tested on real websites and not just IP-checker tools. At ProxiesThatWork.com, we provide:

• 150 proxies for $3/month
• Live-tested across 1,000+ websites every 5 minutes
• Instant dashboard setup with IP authorization

Most scraping guides will teach you “how to plug a proxy into requests.” That’s the easy part. The harder, more important lesson is this: Proxies don’t solve scraping. Design does.

If you approach scraping as an engineering problem, where proxies, sessions, headers, and behavior all fit together, you’ll stop asking “which proxies won’t get me banned?” and start asking “how do I design scrapers that scale responsibly?”

And that’s where ProxiesThatWork fit in - not as magic bullets, but as dependable infrastructure for smarter scrapers.