A hosts Mapping Can Resemble a Hidden Proxy

A local hosts entry can send a hostname to an unexpected IP without enabling a forward proxy. For a locally resolved connection, the mapping changes the address chosen for that name; it does not perform a proxy handshake.

On Windows, inspect the relevant entry in the system hosts file and the resolver-cache view:

ipconfig /displaydns

Microsoft documents that this cache includes hosts-file entries as well as recently obtained DNS records. A successful lookup therefore does not establish that the answer came from a DNS server.

Keep address selection and proxy selection as separate observations. Changing browser proxy preferences cannot remove an unrelated hosts mapping, and finding a mapping does not prove that every application resolves that destination locally.