How do I get someone's location from an IP address?
Hi, everyone. Leo Notenboom here for
Askleo.com with a very, very common question.
Here's an example.
I have the IP address of someone who's causing me some problems.
Can I get their name and location from that?
No.
No, you cannot.
And trust me, you want it this way.
This is perhaps one of the most common questions I get, and usually it's a result
of some harassment or bullying or some other issue that has
people looking at something they've received.
Maybe it's email, maybe it's a message or
connection, maybe it's something else, and they've got an IP address
and they want specifically to find out who's at the other end, who did that?
You cannot find out.
Not without some help.
Now, that help is going to be hard to come by.
Let's review, though, exactly what this is all about.
Ip addressing, which is short for Internet
protocol addressing, simply means that every machine connected
to a network has its own unique address, its IP address.
For example, when you take a look at
Com, you're connecting to a server on the Internet,
and that server has a specific IP address, which is how your browser or whatever
other tool you're using knows to find that server.
The issue, of course, is that an IP address, in a way, it's a made-up number.
It really doesn't have any basis in what I would call physical reality.
Yes, there is information about how the network
is structured and how to get your request from where you are to the server
at that IP address, but it has nothing to do with that server's physical location.
It has everything to do with that server's logical or electrical or network location.
Now, there is publicly available information about IP addresses,
and this is something honestly, I use it from time to time myself.
The
A-R-I-N, the American Registry for Internet numbers is what I would call
the canonical place to find out who owns an IP address.
They are designed for the United States, but if the IP address you happen
to request from them or you query them for, happens to be serviced by another
country or another service, they'll point you at the right one.
The issue, of course, is that all the A-R-I-N will do is tell
you who the ISP is that owns that IP address.
Another tool that I use frequently is DomainTools.
Com, or more specifically, whois.
Domaintools. Com.
They do essentially the same a lookup
and present you with who the owner of that IP address is.
Plot IP is one that I think a lot of people gravitate towards because it
promises to tell you where on the planet the IP address is.
Well, no, not really.
For example, when I use plot IP on my own
IP address, it shows me as being in New Jersey.
I'm not in New Jersey.
I'm on the other side of the country.
And the difference, of course, is that my ISP is headquarter.
Yeah, they're in New Jersey.
The user, as the user of this IP address,
I am not the owner of the IP address, which means that the information that is
publicly available about that address does not include information about me.
And more importantly, the information that might be available
through Plot IP or even some other services is almost never
the actual physical location of the individual at that IP address.
Sometimes they can get close,
they can get to your neighborhood maybe, to your city, to your state,
to your country, but never to your actual physical address.
Now, that doesn't mean, though, that that information isn't available.
Remember, you got your IP address, your Internet connection from your ISP.
They know where you live.
They know where the data is coming from.
They know what the wire is connected to, right?
From their center to your house.
They know who's at each IP address, but they won't tell you.
And you want it that way.
Remember, if somebody were able to say, Hey, I've got this IP address,
please tell me where it is, and the ISP were to say, Yeah,
they're here, you've now lost all of your privacy
because anybody could do that to you as well.
So what is the solution?
What is the help you need?
You're not going to like it, but it's law enforcement.
And the reason I say you're not going to like it is that for the kinds of things
that I typically hear people asking about, be it spam or online harassment or
bullying, law enforcement is rarely in a position to be able to help.
Sometimes they don't have the technical
expertise, although that's changing over time.
More often than not, the kinds of issues that I'm being asked
about and that people are trying to solve don't raise to the level of severity that
the police or law enforcement will actually take action on.
They'll say, Yep, sorry that's happening to you,
but we have more important things we need to be spending our time on.
So the police can help.
They have the ability to help.
And that usually involves getting a court order and going to the ISP and saying,
Hey, give us the information because we've got this court order.
But by and large, they are unable to help
because they are a scarce resource themselves.
They just don't have the ability to do so.
Now, there is one other thing you might consider doing.
Again, it's grasping at a straw, and that is if you have the IP address
of somebody that's causing you trouble, complain to the ISP.
In other words, you can find out who the ISP is.
You can find out who my ISP is from my IP address.
If you complain to my ISP, they might do something.
They might not.
You may never, ever hear from them.
But on the off chance that they care,
then it's probably worth at least complaining to them.
Most of them have an abuse email address that you can send your complaint to.
Typically, that's meant to deter spammers,
and that's fine if that's what's happening to you.
But if there are other issues involved,
then that abuse email address may or may not actually get you the results you want.
Like I said, if it's important enough, take it to the police.
Definitely take it to the police,
especially if that means creating a record that you may then use later as backup
information should things escalate to being much more dangerous.
But that's really the only recourse.
If the situation is severe enough, reach out to law enforcement.
Otherwise, understand that what you are looking for,
the location of somebody at an IP address, is something that neither you nor I stand
a chance of being able to get to on our own.
I'm sorry that it is that way,
but as I point out, it has to be that way for your own privacy as well.
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I'm Leo Notenboom, and this is Askleo.com.
Thanks for watching.