How to Setup Lightweight HTTP Proxy Server using Proxy.py on EC2

Takahiro Iwasa

Aug 30, 2022

1 min read

EC2 Proxy.py Python

Proxy.py, a lightweight HTTP proxy server, can be used on EC2 instances to access internal websites and APIs.

pypi.org

proxy.py

⚡ Fast • 🪶 Lightweight • 0️⃣ Dependency • 🔌 Pluggable • 😈 TLS interception • 🔒 DNS-over-HTTPS • 🔥 Poor Mans VPN • ⏪ Reverse & ⏩ Forward • 👮🏿 Proxy Server framework • 🌐 Web Server framework • ➵ ➶ ➷ ➠ PubSub framework • 👷 Work acceptor & executor framework.

aws.amazon.com

AWS Systems Manager announces support for port forwarding to remote hosts using Session Manager

Install Proxy.py with the following command.

pip install proxy.py

Launch Proxy.py with the following command. After launching, you can view access logs in the terminal.

proxy --port 8080

pid:3330 [I] plugins.load:85 - Loaded plugin proxy.http.proxy.HttpProxyPlugin
pid:3330 [I] tcp.listen:82 - Listening on 127.0.0.1:8080
pid:3330 [I] pool.setup:108 - Started 1 acceptors in threaded mode
...

If you want to keep running the proxy after terminating the SSH session, use the following command instead.

nohup proxy --port 8080 > /dev/null &

Establish an SSH tunnel with the following command.

ssh -L 8080:localhost:8080 -i .ssh/YOUR_PRIVATE_KEY ec2-user@YOUR_HOST

Try accessing Google through the proxy server with the following command.

curl www.google.com -x http://localhost:8080

I find Proxy.py to be very handy when the situation does not call for setting up Nginx.

I hope you will find this post useful.