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When I use Charles Proxy for iOS and play some games, I recognize that they etablish connections with the protocol prefix "socket://" followed by an IP address (instead of a hostname, which is always present for other HTTP(s) connections). I'd assume that those are websockets.

Currently, I'm trying to implement a tool to track rudimentary network activity. To archive that, I'm using the NEKit ( https://zhuhaow.me/NEKit/ ) in combination with the NEPacketTunnelProvider extension for iOS. Using that, I was able to set up a local HTTP Proxy server and setup the network interface to redirect every HTTP(s) request over that local proxy. Through an observer, I was able to see all the requested hostnames.

Now I found out, that some games (those which are using websockets) are not working properly with my solution. Regarding to this discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16694670 it seems like proxying the HTTP(s) data flow doesn't enable me to handle websocket connections:

Yes, but the problem with Charles (well, iOS related at least) is that iOS websockets don't go through the HTTP Proxy configured. They're just considered a raw socket. Thus, even on desktop Charles, it's a nogo.

Due to that, some apps don't even work when my tracker is enabled, since they can't etablish a connection to their servers.

Is there the possibility to archive something similar for the websocket connections since the combination of GCDHTTPProxyServer ( NEKit ) and NEProxySettings ( NetworkExtension ) is only working for HTTP(s)? How can I track and (even better) proxy websocket connections?

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