Shutterstock Photographer Forum :: View topic - can someone in the usa tell who i am with my ip adress?

henrikl · Joined: 23 Aug 2008 Posts: 712

Hi

There is someone in the usa i wouldnt want to know who i im. He/she has my ip adress. Is there some way i can be traced down to who i im or where i have surfed?

Thanks a lot!

geoffwnz · Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:39 pm

In theory, yes. Not sure how easy it is in practice.

Best bet would be to request a new IP address from your ISP if they allocate them.

rinder99 · Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2012 10:39 pm

If course. theres some very smart people out there.if your afraid of something get off the internet.I have people posting things I've said 20 years ago that I can't even find or even know where they found it.

privacy?? forget about it.

henrikl · Joined: 23 Aug 2008 Posts: 712

karimala · Joined: 04 Sep 2005 Posts: 2237 Location: Sacramento, CA

Anonymous and human rights activists in the Middle East are big on using Tor for security. The activists use it to send out videos from the uprisings without their governments being able to identify them. This is how all those videos of crackdowns against the citizens of Syria, etc. are getting out to the world. Works pretty well, from what I keep reading.

https://www.torproject.org/

Also, Firefox has an add-on called HTTPS Everywhere that makes your browser more secure.

Not sure if either will help in your current situation, but they will help in preventing anyone else from obtaining your ISP.

semmickphoto · Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2012 4:16 am

No, it is almost impossible to find out who you are for a normal person, unless they are seriously good hackers. Even the governement cant obtain personal information from ISPs without a court ruling the ISP has to provide such formation. If this person does a back trace on the IP address it will end at the ISP. Your IP address will never have your name publically against it outside the ISP. However, they might be able to find out your rough location and what you have been posting on the net.

However, if this IP address is from your personal website they can check the owner of the website very easily because thats public information. On whois.com all websites can be traced with an IP address of the website.

If we could check easily who is behind an IP address, governments wouldnt have such difficulties taking down private persons leeching copyrighted content via P2P networks. IP addresses are considered private personal information:

--------------------------------
How Can Users be Traced from their IP Addresses?

Once an IP address is captured several methods can be used to trace the user. These tools can be found at http://consumer.net/tracert.asp.

Determine who owns the network. IP addresses are distributed in blocks to network providers or private companies. By searching IP registration databases it is possible to determine who owns an IP address block. Databases are available on the Internet for the Americas, Europe, and Asia-Pacific regions. Sophisticated computer break-ins sometimes include an attempt to erase the IP addresses captured by the log files to prevent this type of lookup.

Perform a "reverse lookup." This converts the IP address into a computer name [Example: convert 206.156.18.122 into www.consumer.net]. This is used to determine if a computer is part of a registered Internet domain.

Conduct a Traceroute. When information packets travel through the Internet they pass through several computers in a hierarchical fashion. Normally packets pass from the user to their Internet Service Provider (ISP) until it reaches the user's "backbone" provider. It then transfers to the destination "backbone " provider down to the ISP of the destination computer and finally to the intended recipient. It is often possible to determine an approximate physical location of an IP address in this fashion. It is also possible to determine the computer's ISP and/or network provider even if the computer itself is not part of a domain. This is usually how junk e-mail or "spam" is traced.

Review domain registration information via the "WHOIS" databases. Domain registration information is available via the Internet by performing a WHOIS on the domain name portion of the computer name [Example: for www.consumer.net perform WHOIS CONSUMER.NET to obtain the registration information].

Search the Internet for the IP address and/or computer name. It is often possible to find matches from users making public postings on discussion boards or from web sites that leave their log files open to the Internet. Of course, web site owners and/or banner networks could have additional non-public information based on activities at their web sites.

Source
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/legacy/ntiahome/privacy/files/smith.htm

duneratt · Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2012 8:58 am

It depends on the tracker's time, expertise, and resources versus the trackee's and how/where they connect to the net. It can be done.

peteklinger · Posted: Tue May 01, 2012 12:39 am

No, the IP address only shows where you connected from. If you are like most people your connection at home is not even a fixed IP address. Your carrier assigns a new one randomly, some every time you connect, some once a month.

If you turn off your DSL modem or whatever device you have, and wait a minute, then re-connect, you should have a new IP address.

So NO, the IP address alone won't say who you are. It will show where you are, and that's often wrong.

If someone is tracking you live while you are online and has the tools, software and skills, they can track back more information. Even then it's not as easy as they make it look on TV.

Here's mine at this moment. 99.63.168.67 and if I look that up it says,

OrgName: AT&T Internet Services
OrgId: SIS-80
Address: 2701 N. Central Expwy # 2205.15
City: Richardson
StateProv: TX
PostalCode: 75080
Country: US

NetRange: 99.0.0.0 - 99.127.255.255

(everything from 99.0.0.0 to 99.127.255.255 could be assigned to me at any time, by AT&T, although it's probably regional based on server locations)

I'm in Wisconsin, not Texas. :)

Here's what someone can sea easily... plus there are simple codes that will show your country and registered location, but nothing like, your physical street address, name or phone number, from the IP. It changes all the time, and service providers have blocks.

Use that number, enter it in the network solutions request form and see what people see. There you go. :-)

Try your own and see what it says:

http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/index.jsp

Enter your IP address and see. That information alone will not say who you are and often not where you are, unless you are the owner of the website and have a server of your own.