Ip Address

[Old55]

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[Jollygoodfellow]

I'm not so knowledgeable to do with computers. Just how do IP Addresses work and what personal information do they contain? As I understand it every computer has a unique IP Address. If I were to email someone or post information online like on this forum what if any personal information is to be found from my IP Address?I had an incident this week after emailing someone they seemed to know the exact location I live. Not a problem for me but it was kinda odd and got me thinking.

I probably can not explain this to well but anyway a IP address is just like a home address and the information can be found by different programs all over the web.Your ip address will give away your location,say your ip is 678.987.987 then its like a area code for where you live.With this information even your service provider is known. As for this forum your IP address is not shown to the public but it is shown to admins. Hope that help some and Im sure some one else can add to what I said. :welcome:

[Old55]

Thank you! Now I know how she knew my location. She works in the computer field in Manila guess she was doing some detective work!

[Mr Lee]

Let me go beyond what the Boss said, it will usually depend on which provider a person uses and if they use IE or Firefox or another way to access the Internet, as each will or may have a different ip. There are some providers who use the same ip address even when a person lives in another state but many providers are just for certain states and even different ip's for different areas, so when a person is using that provider then it would be obvious that that person is from that state or area. As Tom said, on here we keep members ip's private but on most forums the forum staff can see the ip and basically will know where you are within the world unless of course you are using a proxy server and then all bets are off. I often used a proxy server in the past to see how it worked and I showed ip addresses from all over the world, kind of playing with peoples heads. Tip, did you get it. Now to go a little more, each computer has a personal id and that can be tracked by the provider to that user, so if a person was going to send an email to a person and did not want it traced back directly to them, they could take a laptop that had never been used before and drive or fly many miles away from their home and then do searches for open wireless routers and find one and lock in and then send that email and then destroy that computer or never use it again. I always warn people to never have an open unprotected router because some pervert might sign into their router and do that or download child porn and then that persons residence might end up being raided or worse. Always lock down your wireless and when not in use, shut it off if possible. When I power down my computers, the main router also powers down and the other router does not broadcast an id. Just some more info for you.

[Jollygoodfellow]

Let me go beyond what the Boss said, it will usually depend on which provider a person uses and if they use IE or Firefox or another way to access the Internet, as each will or may have a different ip. There are some providers who use the same ip address even when a person lives in another state but many providers are just for certain states and even different ip's for different areas, so when a person is using that provider then it would be obvious that that person is from that state or area. As Tom said, on here we keep members ip's private but on most forums the forum staff can see the ip and basically will know where you are within the world unless of course you are using a proxy server and then all bets are off. I often used a proxy server in the past to see how it worked and I showed ip addresses from all over the world, kind of playing with peoples heads. Tip, did you get it. Now to go a little more, each computer has a personal id and that can be tracked by the provider to that user, so if a person was going to send an email to a person and did not want it traced back directly to them, they could take a laptop that had never been used before and drive or fly many miles away from their home and then do searches for open wireless routers and find one and lock in and then send that email and then destroy that computer or never use it again. I always warn people to never have an open unprotected router because some pervert might sign into their router and do that or download child porn and then that persons residence might end up being raided or worse. Always lock down your wireless and when not in use, shut it off if possible. When I power down my computers, the main router also powers down and the other router does not broadcast an id. Just some more info for you.

IE and fiefox are browsers,how has that got to do with IP address????? :welcome:

[Mr Lee]

Let me go beyond what the Boss said, it will usually depend on which provider a person uses and if they use IE or Firefox or another way to access the Internet, as each will or may have a different ip. There are some providers who use the same ip address even when a person lives in another state but many providers are just for certain states and even different ip's for different areas, so when a person is using that provider then it would be obvious that that person is from that state or area. As Tom said, on here we keep members ip's private but on most forums the forum staff can see the ip and basically will know where you are within the world unless of course you are using a proxy server and then all bets are off. I often used a proxy server in the past to see how it worked and I showed ip addresses from all over the world, kind of playing with peoples heads. Tip, did you get it. Now to go a little more, each computer has a personal id and that can be tracked by the provider to that user, so if a person was going to send an email to a person and did not want it traced back directly to them, they could take a laptop that had never been used before and drive or fly many miles away from their home and then do searches for open wireless routers and find one and lock in and then send that email and then destroy that computer or never use it again. I always warn people to never have an open unprotected router because some pervert might sign into their router and do that or download child porn and then that persons residence might end up being raided or worse. Always lock down your wireless and when not in use, shut it off if possible. When I power down my computers, the main router also powers down and the other router does not broadcast an id. Just some more info for you.

IE and fiefox are browsers,how has that got to do with IP address????? :welcome:

Try it and see! OK, I will answer you Boss. It will depend on what provider a person is using to access the Internet. If a person was using a provider who uses their own ip then when they used Firefox or IE then their ip would go back to who was providing their fast access and not the provider they were using for surfing. For instance, I often use the dreaded AOL to access because I am kind of stuck in my ways and had been using it back when I first got on the Internet, but my fast access is being provided by a different provider so my IE or Firefox ip is different than the ip while I am on AOL. I also have a USB stick which provides Internet access and it shows up as a different ip when plugged into my computer and when I use IE or another browser than AOL. Sorry if my first post was not more succinct.

[Mr Lee]

And another way to really screw with peoples minds besides a proxy server is to use a program like http://www.symantec.com/norton/symantec-pcanywhere and log onto your home computer from anywhere in the world and then your ip will show up as the home computers ipThis will also work when people want to use web sites like Hulu.com that do not allow access from outside the US. As a note here, you will need faster speeds on both ends when using that.