Web Master Proxy Gives Geosearching to Google Users

idcloak releases a Web Master Proxy which allows users to avoid regional bias on Google search results that affect the rankings, language and news items displayed. The tool is especially useful for those working in Search Engine Optimization

idcloak releases the Web Master Proxy, a free web-based service which allows users to carry out Google results in countries other than their own. The free service also reveals just how geo-centric the search engine has become.
“Google results are heavily determined by searcher location, which is useful in some cases, but a pain in others,” says idcloak’s senior researcher, Robin Welles. “Locally tailored search results are great if you are looking for a restaurant, or planning a holiday – since Google knows what kinds of sites people from your location like to see. But in many cases you need to break out of that filter bubble and see what results show up in other locations.”
Welles introduces several applications for this geosearching as she calls it: “English-speaking expats might be tired of Google.com redirecting to a local foreign-language version of the site. The proxy ensures not only the correct language is displayed, but that the results are ranked for America or the UK.”
This last point should be of especial interest to those working in marketing, “Proxy geo-searching is perhaps the only way to study SEO (Search Engine Optimization) work at the international level. Certain advertisers may believe that because they are on Page 1 on their country’s IP addresses, they are on Page 1 in every country. This is often not the case. The proxy service allows them to check.”
Google of course offers country-specific versions of its site, such as google.fr for France or google.co.uk for the UK, but idcloak found that the presented results were still based on searcher location, not by country domain. “Foreign users are under the impression that if they just access the site using the country domain name (for example .co.uk for the UK), they will receive the same results seen by internet users in that country. The reality is that significant differences occur – especially pertaining to news reports about the searched term.”
The Web Master Proxy, currently allows searches in the US, UK and Japan, and will soon add additional servers. In the meantime, the idcloak site also offers an extensive international public IP list which can be filtered to find public proxies in almost any country. Prefiltered lists are also available, such as the Polish proxy list.
For more information on the issue of Google filtering – read Google Search Provider: The Google Filter Bubble And What You Can Do About It.