Off-shore IP addresses

Modified on: Fri, 10 Mar, 2023 at 1:13 PM

My IP address is stuck in another country

Hi, I recently bought a barely used laptop (Legion 5) on eBay and installed windows normally.

Everything worked great, except I noticed having slow download speeds (2 mbps), even with an ethernet connection. My main PC has a download speed of over 200 mbps using the same ethernet cord. I realized all the internet speed test sites and “What is my IP?” sites kept saying I had an IP address in the UK, I live in Chicago. All the other devices, several PCs, phones, and iPads connected to the modem don’t have this issue.

Here are the things I’ve tried without success:

– Using a VPN (Mullvad, even with changing to several other countries I’m not able to change my IP addresses location)

– Refreshing and renewing IP using the command prompt

The only other thing I haven’t done is download all the latest windows updates, it’s taking a while.

Any ideas or advice is much appreciated!

Off-shore IP addresses

Frequently, an IP address’s geolocation will inaccurately display a location far from where the hosting server is physically housed. A website may be hosted on a server in Amsterdam, but the server’s IP address is showing a US geolocation. How is that possible?

  • What is geolocation?
  • Geolocation Inaccuracy
  • Is there any way to find an IP’s exact location?
  • Traceroute
  • Any Issues?

What is geolocation?

Geolocation is the mapping of an IP address or MAC address to the real-world geographic location of an Internet-connected computing or a mobile device. It is not the actual physical address of the hosting server.

An IP’s geolocation is not the exact physical location of the hosting server itself, but instead a rough approximation of where the IP is from.

Geolocation Inaccuracy

Server IP addresses at A2 Hosting often show different geolocation than their actual physical location. There is not an infinite amount of IP addresses. IP addresses are often leased upon availability. If a company (e.g. A2 Hosting) leases IP addresses from a US provider, those IP addresses will then have a US geolocation (even if the server is physically sitting in another country.)

Is there any way to find an IP’s exact location?

There is no completely foolproof way to determine an IP address’s exact location, short of a warrant (or some sort of legal document) to determine the location from an internet service provider (ISP.)

Traceroute

If you would like to see the path packets take to the actual physical location of the server, you can utilize the traceroute (or tracert) program. This method allows you to see the journey a site takes from being housed on a server until it appears in front of you on a screen. The process shows the different IP addresses that a site will use before showing its’ final IP address (and thus, why a server housed in a different geographical location may show an IP address that appears to be from an entirely different country.) The last three entries of a trace (using traceroute or tracert) will show the carrier (internet provider) of the data center your server is housed.

Any Issues?

If you have any questions regarding offshore IP addresses and their geolocations, A2 Hosting’s customer support team will be more than happy to assist you. The support team can assist via LiveChat, by submitting a support ticket, or by phone.

Article Details

  • Product: All accounts
  • Level: Beginner

DataLocker Support

The Geolocation data for my IP address is incorrect. Print

Modified on: Fri, 10 Mar, 2023 at 1:13 PM

SafeConsole uses third-party location services to obtain its geolocation data for each IP address.

If running SafeConsole On-Premises, please make sure your SafeConsole server can access hostnames: ip-api.com and ipinfo.io Even without a connection to these domains, the GeoFence settings will still work using IP addresses.

If you notice an IP location is incorrect, this may be due to the internet provider (ISP) reporting incorrect location data.

Another possible cause of this issue could come from users that are going through a proxy server that is being hosted in a different area than the user.

You may use this free lookup service: https://www.iplocation.net/

Once you have searched the IP address in question, you will find that there are different locations assigned to that IP address on different services.

To combat this issue, we have added a new feature in SafeConsole v5.1.0. On the Server Settings page, you will find a Geolocation Customization area where you can edit an IP’s location to its exact location. This will help you better identify your users and give you peace of mind about their exact locations.

Additionally, you can add IPs to the table that may be missing using the below button:

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