What is a Proxy Server?
A proxy server acts as an intermediary server that forwards content requests from multiple clients to various servers on the internet. A reverse proxy server is a type of proxy server typically positioned behind a private network's firewall, directing client requests to the appropriate backend servers. Reverse proxies improve abstraction and control levels to ensure smooth network traffic flow between clients and servers.
Common use cases for reverse proxy servers include:
Load Balancing
Reverse proxy servers function as "traffic controllers," distributing client requests across a group of backend servers to maximize speed and capacity. This prevents excessive traffic from overloading any single server and degrading performance. If one server goes offline, the load balancer redirects traffic to the remaining online servers.
Web Acceleration
Reverse proxies can compress data for transmission and cache frequently requested content, accelerating traffic flow between clients and servers. Additionally, they offload tasks like SSL encryption to reduce backend server load and improve performance.
Security and Anonymity
By intercepting requests headed to backend servers, reverse proxy servers protect the backend's identity and provide an extra layer of defense against security threats. They also allow access to multiple servers under a single record locator (URL), irrespective of the structure of the local area network.
NGINX Plus and NGINX Overview
NGINX Plus and NGINX are class-leading load balancing solutions, trusted by high-traffic websites such as Dropbox, Netflix, and Zynga. Globally, over 450 million websites rely on NGINX Plus and NGINX Open Source to deliver content quickly, reliably, and securely.
As a software-based reverse proxy, NGINX Plus not only provides similar functionality to hardware-based solutions at a lower cost but is also deployable in both public cloud environments and private data centers. By contrast, deploying customer-proprietary hardware-based reverse proxies in data centers is generally not permitted when using cloud infrastructure vendors.