You can monetize your app users by partnering with providers that offer SDKs for residential proxy networks. These services let users opt-in to share their internet connection, earning you revenue while they get benefits like ad-free experiences.<p>How It Works: Providers like Proxyrack, Live Proxies, Rayobyte, and Infatica allow you to integrate their SDKs into your app. Users who agree to join the proxy network contribute their device’s bandwidth, often used for web scraping, and you get paid based on their activity—typically per monthly or daily active user.<p>So it need not be "compromised Android SetTop Boxes", but just millions of free apps running on user's phones.
We observed the same behavior. Each request used a different IP address and a random user agent. In our case, most of the IP addresses belonged to Chinese ISPs. They went to great lengths to avoid being blocked, but at the same time used user agents such as Windows 95/98 or IE 5. Fortunately, the combination of the odd user agents and the fact that they still use HTTP/1.1 makes them somewhat easy to identify. So you can use a captcha on more expensive endpoints to block them.
I don't understand the current thing about "AI Crawlers". Maybe someone can help educate me.<p>How is it related to AI? Do AI crawlers do something different from traditional search index crawlers? Or is it simply a proliferation of crawlers because of the growth of AI products?<p>What makes AI special in this context?