Does SOCKS5 Encrypt Your Traffic?
SOCKS5 relays connections. Encryption depends on another protected layer, and its username/password method does not encrypt credentials by itself.
No encryption is added merely by selecting SOCKS5. It negotiates relayed connections and authentication; the 5 identifies a protocol version, not an encryption level.
For HTTPS, a client can open the SOCKS connection and run destination TLS through it. The website data is protected by TLS under the client's normal certificate checks. Send plain HTTP over the same route and it remains plain HTTP: the relay does not upgrade the application's protocol.
The username/password method in RFC 1929 also has no encryption of its own. Its account controls access but does not make the exchange confidential on an unprotected path. Additional transports or other negotiated methods can change protection, so inspect what your client and server actually use.
Check the secure destination protocol, certificate verification, any protection on the client-to-proxy link and the negotiated authentication method. The operator can still receive destination information and connection metadata. In curl, socks5h changes where a target hostname is resolved; it adds no cryptographic layer.