> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.obscura.sh/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.obscura.sh/guides/configure-stealth-and-proxies.md).

# Configure stealth and proxies

### Stealth mode

```bash
obscura fetch https://example.com --stealth
obscura serve --stealth
obscura scrape url1 url2 --stealth
obscura mcp --stealth
```

`--stealth` is a global flag, so it works before or after the subcommand and applies to `fetch`, `serve`, `scrape`, and `mcp`. In a `scrape` run each worker inherits it.

What `--stealth` changes:

* Uses the wreq HTTP client with browser-matching TLS fingerprints (ClientHello, ALPN, cipher order).
* Loads a tracker blocklist that drops requests to known analytics and fingerprinting endpoints.
* Bundles webpki roots instead of relying on the system store.

Requires a build that includes the stealth feature. Release binaries on the Releases page include it. To build it yourself:

```bash
cargo build --release --features stealth
```

### What stealth handles

* Basic bot detection that checks TLS fingerprint or User-Agent.
* Sites that rely on third-party analytics being reachable.

### What stealth does not handle

* Cloudflare interactive challenges.
* Datadome and Akamai bot manager active challenges.
* CAPTCHAs.
* IP-based rate limiting (use proxies).

### Proxies

HTTP proxy:

```bash
obscura fetch https://example.com --proxy http://proxy.example.com:8080
obscura serve --proxy http://proxy.example.com:8080
```

With auth:

```bash
obscura fetch https://example.com --proxy http://user:pass@proxy.example.com:8080
```

SOCKS5:

```bash
obscura fetch https://example.com --proxy socks5://proxy.example.com:1080
```

### Custom User-Agent

```bash
obscura fetch https://example.com --user-agent "Mozilla/5.0 (...) ..."
obscura serve --user-agent "Mozilla/5.0 (...) ..."
```

Default UA matches a recent Chrome on the build platform.

### Browser profile, timezone, and geolocation

The engine presents one of a built-in pool of realistic browser profiles (a mix of Windows and macOS, recent Chrome versions). Each profile keeps `navigator.platform`, `navigator.userAgentData` (platform and platform version), the UA string, and the WebGL/GPU renderer internally consistent, so the surfaces a site fingerprints agree with each other. Windows profiles report ANGLE Direct3D11 renderers, macOS profiles report ANGLE Metal renderers.

A single stable profile is used by default. One IP cycling through different identities is itself a signal, so rotation is opt-in:

```bash
OBSCURA_PROFILE=2 obscura serve          # pin a specific profile by index
OBSCURA_ROTATE_PROFILE=1 obscura serve   # random profile per browser context
```

Timezone is driven by the process zone so `Date` (`getTimezoneOffset`, `toString`) and `Intl.DateTimeFormat` report the same region. Default is `Europe/Berlin`; set it to match the exit IP:

```bash
OBSCURA_TIMEZONE=America/New_York obscura serve
```

`navigator.geolocation` reports configurable coordinates. Set them as `lat,lon` and keep them consistent with the timezone and proxy region:

```bash
OBSCURA_GEOLOCATION="40.7128,-74.0060" obscura serve
```

Keep these aligned. A rotated or mismatched profile carries no matching TLS or timezone fingerprint, so when you pin a proxy region or TLS fingerprint, leave rotation off and set the timezone and geolocation to the same region. See [Environment variables](/reference/environment-variables.md) for the full list.

### Combine

```bash
obscura serve \
  --stealth \
  --proxy http://user:pass@proxy.example.com:8080 \
  --user-agent "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 ..."
```


---

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