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How to Detect Proxies on Your Site with Flask Backend and IPQuery API

by dvrSeptember 7th, 2024

Too Long; Didn't Read

This tutorial walks you through creating a Flask application that detects if incoming requests are from proxy servers using the IPQuery API. It covers setting up a backend, rendering results in HTML using Jinja2, and running tests to display IP-related details.

featured image - How to Detect Proxies on Your Site with Flask Backend and IPQuery API

In this tutorial, we'll build a Flask application that checks whether the incoming requests are from proxy servers using the IPQuery API. We’ll also render a simple HTML page to display the results of the proxy check dynamically.

Requirements:

Python 3.x Flask requests library to interact with the IPQuery API

You can install the required libraries using pip:

pip install flask requests

Step 1: Setting Up the Flask Backend

First, let’s set up a basic Flask application. We’ll create an endpoint that receives the visitor's IP address and uses the IPQuery API to check if the IP is associated with any proxy services.

We will render the results on an HTML page using Jinja2's {{ }} syntax to inject data dynamically.

app.py

from flask import Flask, render_template, request
import requests

app = Flask(__name__)

# Helper function to query IP info from IPQuery API
def check_ip(ip):
    api_url = f"https://api.ipquery.io/{ip}"
    response = requests.get(api_url)
    return response.json()

# Route to handle the proxy check
@app.route('/')
def index():
    visitor_ip = request.remote_addr  # Get the IP address of the visitor
    ip_data = check_ip(visitor_ip)  # Fetch IP details from IPQuery
    is_proxy = ip_data['risk']['is_proxy']  # Check if the IP is a proxy

    # Render HTML with the result
    return render_template('index.html', ip=visitor_ip, ip_data=ip_data, is_proxy=is_proxy)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    app.run(debug=True)

Step 2: HTML Template with Jinja2

Now, let’s create an HTML template that will display the visitor’s IP and whether or not it is a proxy. We’ll use Flask’s built-in template engine Jinja2 to dynamically inject data.

templates/index.html

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
    <meta charset="UTF-8">
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
    <title>Proxy Detection</title>
    <style>
        body {
            font-family: Arial, sans-serif;
            background-color: #f4f4f4;
            padding: 20px;
        }
        .container {
            max-width: 600px;
            margin: 0 auto;
            background-color: #fff;
            padding: 20px;
            border-radius: 10px;
            box-shadow: 0 2px 10px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.1);
        }
        .status {
            color: {% if is_proxy %} red {% else %} green {% endif %};
            font-weight: bold;
        }
    </style>
</head>
<body>
    <div class="container">
        <h1>IP Address Information</h1>
        <p><strong>Your IP Address:</strong> {{ ip }}</p>
        
        <h2>Proxy Status</h2>
        <p class="status">
            {% if is_proxy %}
                This IP is associated with a proxy service.
            {% else %}
                This IP is not associated with a proxy service.
            {% endif %}
        </p>

        <h2>Location Information</h2>
        <ul>
            <li><strong>Country:</strong> {{ ip_data['location']['country'] }}</li>
            <li><strong>City:</strong> {{ ip_data['location']['city'] }}</li>
            <li><strong>Latitude:</strong> {{ ip_data['location']['latitude'] }}</li>
            <li><strong>Longitude:</strong> {{ ip_data['location']['longitude'] }}</li>
            <li><strong>Timezone:</strong> {{ ip_data['location']['timezone'] }}</li>
        </ul>

        <h2>Risk Analysis</h2>
        <ul>
            <li><strong>Is VPN:</strong> {{ ip_data['risk']['is_vpn'] }}</li>
            <li><strong>Is Tor:</strong> {{ ip_data['risk']['is_tor'] }}</li>
            <li><strong>Is Data Center:</strong> {{ ip_data['risk']['is_datacenter'] }}</li>
        </ul>
    </div>
</body>
</html>

Step 3: Testing the Application

Once the Flask application and the HTML template are set up, you can run the application by executing:

python app.py

Open your browser and navigate to http://127.0.0.1:5000/. The page will show the visitor’s IP address, location details, and whether or not the IP is associated with a proxy.