This is a good callout - I’ve tried my best thus far to limit the use of proxies unless absolutely necessary and then focus on reputable providers (even though these are a bit more pricey).

Definitely going to give this more thought though, thank you for the comment

There's a lot of variety in the residential proxy market. Some are sourced from bandwidth sharing SDKs for games with user consent, some are "mislabeled" IPs from ISPs that offer that as a product and then there's a long tail of "hacked" devices. Labeling them generally as sketchy seems wrong.

> Some are sourced from bandwidth sharing SDKs for games with user consent...

The notion that most people installing a game meaningfully consent to unspecified ongoing uses of their Internet connection resold to undeclared third parties gave me a good, hearty belly laugh. Especially expressed so matter-of-factly.

Thank you.

To add, it's also strictly forbidden by all the major ISPs Acceptable Use Policy. At least in the US.

I don't think it's much different than games that force users to watch ads or capturing them in pay-to-win schemes.

When a game shows an unskippable ad, the user is consciously aware of what is happening, as it is happening, and can close the program to stop watching the ad. It is in no sense comparable to what you describe.

When a third party library bundled into a game makes ongoing, commercial, surreptitious use of the user's Internet access, the vast majority of users aren't meaningfully consenting to that use of their residential IP and bandwidth because they understand neither computers nor networks well enough to meaningfully consent.

I don't doubt your bases are sufficiently covered in terms of liablities. I don't doubt that some portion of whatever EULA you have (that your users click right on past) details in eye-watering legalese that you are reselling their IP and bandwidth.

It's just... The notion that there has been any meeting of minds at all between your organization and its games' users on the matter of IP address and bandwidth resale is patently risible.

Legal? probably. Ethical? Absolutely not.

> bandwidth sharing SDKs for games with user consent

What games are you aware of that do this? I want to make sure I have none of them installed.