Web Caching and Replication

8.3. Transparent Proxy Deployment

Transparent deployment of a proxy relies on some network element (a switch or a router) to intercept all traffic from Web clients to Web servers and divert it to a proxy server instead of its actual destination. For this reason, proxies deployed in this manner are called interception proxies.^[2] The network elements that intercept and divert packets to interception proxies are called intercepting elements or simply intercepters.

^[2] Interception proxies are also referred to as transparent proxies. However, the HTTP 1.1 description uses the term transparency to mean semantic transparency (that is, referring to a proxy whose presence does not affect Web behavior semantically) rather than deployment transparency. ...