Am I using the proxy settings or not?

[ColinZeal]

Hello,

I have Ubuntu 14.04 installed and I'm not really sure my SOCKS proxy settings are being used.

I used this: http://torguard.net/checkmytorrentipaddress.php to verify if my torrenting is anonymized and it seems it is: the IP I see on the "Peers" window is the one my VPN gives me, not my actual one. I then proceeded to download a regular torrent, it works fine.

In order to check whether I am really using the authentication, I changed it to some bogus info - the torrent is still downloaded.

Then I checked back the "checkMyTorrentIP" thing and on that case the URL doesn't show any message. So in that situation it seems it tried the authentication and failed.

How can it be explained that the regular torrent still works fine if my authentication info is not OK?

[ciaobaby]

Possibly because you have the client set to listen on any network connection. Is this a proxy specific to qBT or a system proxy?

[ColinZeal]

[quote="ciaobaby"]
Possibly because you have the client set to listen on any network connection. Is this a proxy specific to qBT or a system proxy?
[/quote]

I'm using the "Proxy Server" settings on "Options" > "Connection".

[ciaobaby]

In that case, if and when the proxy fails to be connected qBT will use the connection that IS available.

[ColinZeal]

[quote="ciaobaby"]
In that case, if and when the proxy fails to be connected qBT will use the connection that IS available.
[/quote]

Why will the checkMyTorrentIP thing not work, though? With the correct proxy info, it displays my VPN IP; with no proxy info, it displays my IP; with wrong proxy info, it will say "not working". Using wrong proxy info, either the regular torrent should also not work, or the torrent checker should also work.

Also, is there a way to disable this behaviour? Like, if the proxy is not working, I don't want to do anything.

Thanks for the help.

[ciaobaby]

It can only report the IP that you connect to checkMyTorrentIP with.

With the correct proxy info, it displays my VPN IP;

??

Elaborate please, are you using a VPN or a proxy server? Or both?

Using wrong proxy info, either the regular torrent should also not work, or the torrent checker should also work.

The purpose of any BitTorrent protocol client is to download the payload data and it will do so via ANY available connection, if one drops out it will 'fail over' to one that is active. You can specify the network device that qBT should 'bind' to in Options -> Advanced, but that is only for system devices not internal proxies

[ColinZeal]

It can only report the IP that you connect to checkMyTorrentIP with.

With the correct proxy info, it displays my VPN IP;

??

Elaborate please, are you using a VPN or a proxy server? Or both?

Sorry, I get confused with these network terms. I pay for VPN access and this company provides a proxy for torrenting purposes (https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/f ... ow-open/p1). That's what I'm using, not the VPN itself. What I meant is that the checkMyTorrentIP thing displays the artificial IP, not my actual one.

[ciaobaby]

A proxy is a server that operates as a "third party", your computer makes a request to the proxy, the proxy then passes the request on to the destination, and routes the returned data back to your computer. Having a proxy configured in a BT client, only the traffic from the client goes via the proxy.

A VPN creates a "tunnel" between the network interface  in your computer and the VPN provider, the data in the tunnel is encrypted prior to transmission and decrypted by the provider before it is sent to the destination, the same happens (in reverse) with the returned data. With a VPN configured on your machine, ALL the Internet traffic to and from your computer will go via the VPN.