One of the many benefits of using Squid, in addition to the obvious security benefits, is content caching. The cache increases network performance for fetching clients and lowers internet bandwidth.

Firefox web browser also includes its own built-in cache. Two of them, actually! It has a memory cache and a disk cache. You can view the contents of the cache by entering the following into your navigation bar:

about:cache

From here you can also update the cache or view the details of a specific cached item.

The Firefox web browser cache is designed to increase performance. However, when you have caching being performed by Squid, then using the web browser cache is effectively a duplication of services. When the Firefox disk cache and Squid are both actively caching I often found that connections would hang, become unstable or even become non-responsive. This was the result of the Firefox disk cache conflicting with the Squid cache – two caches trying to do the same task.

While choosing one cache over another might not technically be a ‘better’ option, I have found it’s better to leave the task of caching to Squid as it is a dedicated server designated for one specific role. This frees up Firefox resources to concentrate on rendering content rather than juggling finite resources for multiple tasks inside the browser.

There is also an added security benefit to disabling the Firefox disk cache. When enabled, malicious web content can reside inside the cache. Where memory cache is non-persistent and cleared on Firefox close, the disk cache is persistent and if there is malicious content present, it will get reloaded every time Firefox is booted or until you clear the cache entirely.

It’s best to leave the Firefox memory cache enabled to maintain Firefox web browser performance, as the memory cache poses less threat of cache conflict with Squid to that of the disk cache. To disable the disk cache enter the following into your navigation bar:

about:config

Press ENTER to confirm the warning dialog. Now, search for the configuration string:

browser.cache.disk.enable

Set the value to “false“.

Your disk cache is now disabled. We can verify the change by revisiting the about:cache page.

Most of the caching is now be performed by the Squid proxy server, complemented by the Firefox memory cache.

The post Disable Firefox Web Browser Disk Cache When Using Squid Proxy Server appeared first on Linux Windows and android Tutorials.

Squid Proxy is a veteran program that allows you to have a proxy server running on your system. It is one of the most popular applications in the entire Unix ecosystem. Obviously, it’s open source, which guarantees you won’t have license problems or anything similar. In addition, there is a large community of users willing to shield knowledge to this tool.

Some of its characteristics are:

• Open Source. Squid Proxy is distributed under the GPL license. Vital to have no licensing problems and be used in virtually any project.
• It specializes in Unix systems such as Linux.
• Being a proxy cache supports HTTP, HTTPS, and FTP. Basic internet services.
• SSL compatible to increase connection security.

And many others that have given the role of being practically a standard for Linux.

1. Install Squid Proxy

In this tutorial, I will use a server with Ubuntu 18.04. But, Squid Proxy can be easily installed on many Linux distributions. So, in Ubuntu, the installation process is really simple.

:~$ sudo apt install squid

Next, start, enable and check the service status.

:~$ sudo systemctl start squid
:~$ sudo systemctl enable squid
:~$ sudo systemctl status squid

And that’s. So, let’s configure it.

2.- Changing the Squid Proxy port

By default, Squid uses port 3128. For security reasons it is recommended to change the port where it works. So if you can, do it.

To do it, edit the /etc/squid/squid.conf file and change the port.

:~$ sudo nano /etc/squid/squid.conf

Then, restart the service.

:~$ sudo systemctl restart squid

3. Setting some configurations

Now let’s do some basic configurations with Squid. Remember that its use is very wide and varies according to the server requirements.

First, I don’t think you want to, but you can allow or deny all HTTP traffic. This will remove Internet access from your entire network. So let’s go.

Edit the /etc/squid/squid.conf file. Remove the # at the beginning of the line to set the desired parameter.

:~$ sudo nano /etc/quid/quid.conf

You can also define which websites you want to remove access to. Very useful in organizations and at work.

In this case, I will use two websites. You can add what you want.

acl blocksite1 dstdomain espn.com
acl blocksite2 dstdomain apple.com
http_access deny blocksite1
http_access deny blocksite2

However, if you have a lot of places to block. Ideally, create a blacklist and add it to the configuration file. Create a file /etc/squid/blocked.lst.

:~$ sudo nano /etc/squid/blocked.lst

Now, edit the configuration file and add the list.

acl blocksitelist dstdomain "/etc/squid/blocked.lst"
http_access deny blocksitelist

Another way to block inappropriate sites in the organization is through keywords. Very useful if you don’t remember all the sites to restrict but you will block all those related to it.

acl blockkeyword1 url_regex gmail
acl blockkeyword2 url_regex porn
http_access deny blockkeyword1
http_access deny blockkeyword2

Or if you have a pretty extensive list, you can create a file and place them there. Then you add it to the configuration file. Similar to how it was done with domains.

:~$ sudo nano /etc/squid/blockedkw.lst

acl blockkeywordlist url_regex "/etc/squid/blockedkw.lst"
http_access deny blockkeywordlist

Now, go to the squid configuration file and add the list.

For all these changes to take effect, it is necessary to restart the Squid service.

:~$ sudo systemctl restart squid

And that’s it.

Conclusion

It’s true that Squid Proxy offers a lot of possibilities. However, today I have presented some basic options but very useful at the time of configuring it. It only remains for you to continue using and enjoying this tool.

You can also read “How to Install and Use Pacaur on Arch Linux“.

Please share this post with your friends.

The post Squid Proxy: How to install and configure it on Ubuntu 18.04 / 16.04. appeared first on Linux Windows and android Tutorials.