A simulated internet is connected to a corporate network to more easily and effectively facilitate testing the impact of internet security devices and settings on internet software. The simulated internet has communications pathways between two firewall devices, a web proxy and a publishing firewall, that also protect the corporate network. A test web server on the corporate network is published to the simulated internet by the publishing firewall through reverse proxy as a unique internet name that only exists on the simulated internet One or more test client machines on the corporate network are configured to use the forward proxy firewall of the corporate web proxy to access the unique internet name. With this configuration all the pieces are in place for what the Internet does, except the simulated internet is a private internet under the control of the software tester.