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A site shows a different proxy country or city

You asked for Warsaw, and the site says Krakow or even another country. Often the proxy gave you exactly that address, and it is the databases sites use to locate IPs that disagree.

Updated · Prokso editorial team

Key takeaways
  • Often the proxy gave the right address, and it is the sites' geo databases that disagree
  • On mobile networks a database often shows the city of the carrier's gateway
  • Check the IP with prokso.com/ip and My IP, and match the time zone and language to the IP in the antidetect browser

What the error means

Nobody publishes an official location for an IP address: geo databases estimate it from registration records, provider data and measurements. The databases update differently, so the same address may be in Warsaw in one database and in Krakow in another. More in the glossary: IP geolocation.

The city differs more often than the country. Especially on mobile networks: a carrier sends subscribers to the internet through shared gateways (CGNAT), and a geo database often sees the gateway's city rather than the city where the phone actually is.

Sites and antidetect browsers can locate you by more than the IP. Time zone, browser language, DNS server and WebRTC also hint at where you are, and if they do not match the IP, the site sees a contradiction.

Causes

  • Different geo databases. The site, the antidetect browser and your own check use different databases, so the city, and sometimes the country, differ for the same address.
  • A mobile carrier gateway. Mobile addresses are tied to the carrier's gateways, so the database shows the gateway's city, which can be far from the real device.
  • Precise geo is not set. Without a city or state parameter the gateway gives any address in the country, and without cr an address from any available country.
  • Time zone and language do not match the IP. The antidetect browser takes them from the system or the profile if detection by the proxy IP is off.
  • DNS and WebRTC. DNS queries from your computer and WebRTC can show the site your real network. For SOCKS5 use socks5h:// so the proxy turns site names into addresses.

How to fix it

  1. Check what the proxy actually gave you: curl -x http://USERNAME:PASSWORD@gw.prokso.com:10000 https://prokso.com/ip. The answer is JSON with the fields ip, country, region, city, asn and org.
  2. Open My IP in the same profile or browser: the IP and country should belong to the proxy, and the WebRTC check should not show your own address.
  3. If you need a specific city, set it in the username: USERNAME__cr.pl;city.warsaw. The syntax is in the gateway reference. Precise geo is counted double, and if no addresses match the parameters, the gateway answers 503 NO_RAY.
  4. In the antidetect browser, turn on time zone, language and geolocation detection by the proxy IP, or set them manually to match the address's country.
  5. For mobile proxies where the carrier matters, set it by ASN and do not rely on the city: on mobile networks it is the least accurate.

How to check that it works

Compare three sources: the https://prokso.com/ip answer, the My IP page and what the site or antidetect browser shows. If the IP is the same everywhere and only the city differs, the proxy works correctly and the databases disagree. If the IP itself differs, the request is going around the proxy somewhere.

Two-minute diagnosis

First paste the line into the proxy checker. If the proxy works there, the cause is in your app or its settings. If not, test the line from a terminal:

curl -v -x "http://USERNAME:PASSWORD@gw.prokso.com:823" https://api.ipify.org
  • A < HTTP/1.1 407 line right after CONNECT means the proxy answered. The name after the code, for example NO_USER, points to the cause.
  • The proxy answered CONNECT with 200 and then another code arrived - the proxy works, and that answer came from the website.
  • No answer at all, only a timeout - the connection never reached the proxy: check the host, port and network.

Setup guides where this error comes up

FAQ

Can I fix a site's geo database?

No, the database is run by its owner, not by the proxy service. You can only take another address: on ports 823 and 824 every request gets a new IP, and on a sticky port a new IP comes after the session duration ends.

Why is the country right but the city wrong?

Databases determine the country more reliably, and the city from indirect data. For mobile addresses the city often matches the location of the carrier's gateway.

Why does the site see my country though the IP is right?

Most often it is the time zone, browser language, DNS or WebRTC that gives it away. Check the profile on the My IP page and the antidetect browser settings.

Other proxy errors

407 Proxy Authentication Required403 Forbidden429 Too Many Requests502 Bad Gateway503 Service UnavailableERR_PROXY_CONNECTION_FAILEDERR_TUNNEL_CONNECTION_FAILEDProxy timeoutCloudflare 1015Cloudflare 1020Google: unusual traffic400 Bad Request401 Unauthorized404 Not Found Through a Proxy504 Gateway Timeout444 No ResponseCloudflare 1006, 1007, 1008Cloudflare 1010Cloudflare 1012Cloudflare 522Cloudflare 524SOCKS5 general failureSOCKS5 connection refusedSSL and Certificate ErrorsECONNRESET and ECONNREFUSEDProxyError in Python requestsSSLError in Python Through a ProxyMissing Dependencies for SOCKS SupportProxy Errors in httpx and aiohttpaxios: socket hang upTypeError: fetch failedhttps-proxy-agent and socks-proxy-agent errorsHTTP_PROXY, HTTPS_PROXY and NO_PROXYERR_NO_SUPPORTED_PROXIESERR_SOCKS_CONNECTION_FAILEDProxy login in Puppeteer and PlaywrightProxy login in Seleniumcurl proxy error codesProxy traffic runs out fastSticky IP changed earlyAll error codes

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