On Wed, May 26, 2004 at 11:16:45AM +1000, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> Just wondering if any one has thought about this question before and found the
> answer.
> Authenticating proxy servers do they pass-on user information and credentials?
> I mean after a windows user has sent their credentials to a proxy server beit
> through a pop-up dialogue box or just through the windows client. Does the
> credientials get stripped out or do they flow on throught the ether?

They get stripped, unless the proxy is downstream of another authenticating
proxy, in which case a set of Proxy-Auth credentials gets sent according to
the configuration of the sending proxy.  Rob Collins could tell you a lot
more about that sort of thing, though.

There's actually two different headers for authentication -
Proxy-Authentication: and Authentication:.  Obviously the first is used by
proxies (and stripped out of the on-sent request) while the other is used by
the actual web server, and is typically not mangled at all by the
intermediate proxies.

> (This is a question for all forms of proxy servers from MS, squid, Novell,
> suns etc)

There may be bugs or misimplementations in any proxy software which results
in proxy auth credentials being sent, but it would almost certainly be a
major security bug for the vendor involved.

Read up on the HTTP 1.1 RFCs if you want to know all the gory details of how
HTTP proxy authentication works.

- Matt
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