Proxychains: How to Chain SOCKS5 Proxies

proxychains-ng (the maintained fork of proxychains) is a tool that intercepts a program's network calls and forces them through a proxy — even programs that have no proxy setting. You prefix any command with proxychains4 and its TCP connections are routed through the proxies in your config. It is a staple on Kali and in pentesting workflows precisely because it works with tools that would otherwise connect directly.

It supports HTTP, SOCKS4 and SOCKS5 proxies, and it can chain several of them so your traffic passes through multiple hops in sequence. One important limitation to know upfront: proxychains works by hooking library calls, so it only affects dynamically linked programs — statically linked binaries and some tools bypass it. And it routes TCP, not raw UDP or ICMP (so it cannot proxy a normal ping).

It helps to understand the three chaining modes, because they behave very differently under failure. In strict_chain, traffic must pass through every listed proxy in the exact order given, and if any one is down the connection fails — this is what you want when the order and every hop matter. In dynamic_chain, proxychains skips any dead proxies and uses the rest in order, which is more forgiving for flaky lists. In random_chain, it picks a random subset for each connection, useful for spreading traffic but unpredictable. Whichever you pick, remember that every extra hop multiplies latency and adds another operator who can see your connection metadata, so chain deliberately rather than piling on proxies for a vague sense of extra safety.