It is based on the SOCKS5 proxy and as a result, it has some features specifically designed to help it over the GFW. SS was designed to bypass a specific geographical restriction. So if you wish to check your Gmail, you send a request to a server in X via a SOCKS5 connection which in turn, upon receiving the request, will visit Google and return the result of the request directly to you. The data request doesn't pass through a dedicated tunnel or require nor receive any additional processing during this process. SOCKS5 proxies pass data requests through a connection to the proxy server which, in turn, forwards it to the desired destination. SOCKS proxies transfer data packets regardless of the transfer protocol, making them faster than other application layer proxies. SS and SSR both work in basically the same way in that they are proxies based on SOCKS5. Subsequently, since SSR had been forked and shared by numerous people it has developed into a number of newer iterations. ShadowsocksR (SSR) followed in 2015 when another developer determined that SS was now too easily detected by the GFW. The developer felt it would be good to unblock websites on a fast internet connection whilst being difficult to detect.

Communication between you and the VPN can also be encrypted depending on which system you choose A VPN or virtual private network, encrypts your communication online and internet access is provided by this private network.

SS became very popular very quickly among the affected netizens.ДЄ VPN unblocks websites, by building a private network to transfer data at the network layer. VPNs are commonly used to access blocked content and services, however, in 2012, for a variety of reasons, a developer created Shadowsocks (SS) to circumvent Internet censorship and subsequently shared it on GitHub. Since the inception of the Great Firewall of China (GFW), people there have needed to bypass that restriction in order to access many of the Internets' most popular sites and apps.

Google cloud shadowsocks