I started idMask and received the welcome page, but when I check my public IP using www.whatismyip.com, it has not changed. What's wrong?

Most likely, your browser is not set up to use idMask. Every time you start the idMask application, you need to make sure your browser's proxy settings are configured to send HTTP requests to the idMask application (click here for more information on how to chnage your browser's proxy settings). Conversely, when you close idMask, you need to restore your browser's original proxy settings.

After I shut down my idMask application, my browser no longer works. It keeps displaying the message "connection refused" when I try to access any web page. What's wrong?

The problem is that you forgot to reset your browser's proxy settings. Your browser is still trying to send requests to the idMask application (on your computer), and since you've shut it down, your browser will never receive a reply. Either restore your browser's proxy settings to their original values or launch the idMask application.

What does "unecessay cookies and headers" in the Preferences pane refer to?

Unecessary HTTP headers refers to data that most browsers send with each web request, which can reveal information such as the website that referred you (ie the previous web page you viewed), the operating system and browser you are using, your language preference etc. Select this option if you don't want to reveal this information to the web sites you visit.

Cookies are used by web sites to store information about your visits. For instance your login ID or shopping cart info may be stored in a 'cookie' on your computer, and sent to the web site each time you request a page from that same web site. Cookies are also used by online advertisers to record and compile information about people's browsing patterns. Selecting this checkbox will block all cookies. If you are having problems logging in to any website while using idMask, make sure this option is not selected.

My browser is configured to "auto-detect proxy settings" Does idMask "autodetect proxy" settings too?

No. idMask does not support this feature, nor does it support loading proxy settings from a URL. If your browser is set up this way, you'll need to find the address and port of your proxy server, and enter these values in idMask's proxy configuration pane. Ask your network administrator or ISP for this information.

My company has a policy of recording and monitoring web use by employees. Does idMask make me invisible to my company's tracking system?

Most companies use a proxy server or firewall to enable their employees to share a connection to the Internet. This means that all your web requests are sent to the company proxy server before they are forwarded to the web sites you visit. The company proxy server usually logs the time and URL of every web request to a file. Since idMask encodes the original URL, what appears in your company's log is unreadable. It is very difficult to see which sites you visit by looking at these logs. Keep in mind however, that most browsers are configured to temporarily save copies of the web pages you visit in a "cache" folder on your hard disk; and this can also be used to reveal your browsing history.

If I am using idMask and submit a web form, is the data in the form also hidden?

If your browser displays the parameters of the submitted form as part of the URL (ie an HTTP GET request) then idMask has encoded your form data and made it unreadable. If you don't see this type of cryptic URL in the address bar of your browser, then idMask did not encode the data you sent when you submitted the HTML form.

The difference in the second case is that the form was submitted as an HTTP POST request, which does not send arguments as part of the request URL. Since idMask only encodes the URL and does not modify the body of the HTTP request, arguments passed in the body (as in an HTTP POST request) are not encoded.

Does idMask work with SSL?

Currently idMask only works with regular HTTP requests, and does not handle secure (SSL) requests. In general, if the URL in the address bar begins with "https://" then idMask is not protecting your request. This is an important point to remember, if you visit secure sites while using idMask (since they will not be hidden from your company logs).

My browser's proxy settings show that I am using a SOCKS proxy server. Does idMask work with SOCKS proxy servers?

IdMask does not currently support SOCKS proxy servers. Support for this protocol may be added in the future.

Does idMask support proxy servers that require a userid and password?

Yes, idMask supports authenticating proxy servers. It supports two authentication schemes: BASIC and NTLM (used by Microsoft ISA proxy server).

Ok, I understand how the idMask application running on my computer encodes my URLs before sending them to the anonymizing proxies on the Internet; but does that mean that these proxy servers know what I'm requesting?

The idMask proxy servers must decode URLs because they must know the real address of your requests in order to route them to the intended web sites. IdMask does not record or log any information while doing this. Visit the idmask.com website for our privacy policy.

What is your privacy policy?

Our proxy servers do not record or log any information whatsoever. The idMask application does not contain any spyware, it does not collect any information about you or your computer. Please visit the idmask.com website to get a complete description of our privacy policy.

I run a personal firewall, and every time I start idMask, I am warned that idMask wants to access the internet and act as a server. Why is that?

This is normal. The idMask application needs to act as a server in order to accept requests from your browser, and forward them to idMask proxy servers on the internet, which in turn forward them to the destination website.

Can anyone else connect to my idMask application when it is running on my machine?

No, idMask will only accept web requests originating from the machine on which it is running. This limitation is imposed for security reasons only.

Is idMask open-source? Can I get a copy of the source code?

IdMask is not an open source project. However, we have not obfuscated our classes, so programmers who are familiar with java can decompile and view the undocumented classes, for the purpose of auditing the code.

If idmask.com website is blocked by my firewall, will idMask still work?

If your firewall has blocked the idmask.com domain, then it will not work until you obtain an alternate idMask server address from us. If this happens to you, and you have purchased a ticket to use idMask, please contact us via email (info@idmask.com) to obtain the address of a new server. When you receive this new address information, simply enter it in the 'alternate idmask host service" field in the preferences pane of the idMask application.