The computer's IP address is the number that identifies it on the network when visiting websites, in the same way that a postman finds the address of a home.
In general terms, two computers communicate with each other through their IP addresses, so the IP address is therefore necessary for the server computers that host the websites to know where to send their data.
The reason why it is important to know what an IP address is, is not only cultural, but also very practical, to solve problems with the network and with the internet and, above all, to understand if our privacy is at risk or, in others words, if anyone can know who we are and where we are in the world using the IP address.
Given the technical vastness of the topic, this is a very simplified summary article that leads us to understand what an IP address is in broad terms, what it is used for and, above all, how important it is for privacy .
As mentioned above, IP addresses can be imagined as if they were street addresses of the Internet country.
The IP addresses of computers are made up of numbers and every site, computer or server in the world, when connected to the internet, is assigned an IP address, random or fixed by whoever manages it.
When you go to upload a website to Chrome, the computer sends a request to the IP address of the server where the website is located and downloads its content.
The website then sends its content to the PC using the computer's IP address.
The operation is very similar to sending a postcard to someone, on which the home address is written so that the postman can deliver it correctly.
IPv4, the standard version currently used, made up of 4 series of numbers ranging from or to 255, for example: 2.34.211.123
IPv6, the most recent version, made up of 8 groups of 4 hexadecimal digits (the rules are much more complex and are virtually infinite).
Servers are computers that share resources on the network or on the Internet, clients are PCs or smartphones that connect to servers to download data or view websites (in the case of web servers).
The servers have a fixed IP, the home PC and the smartphone, on the other hand, have a dynamic IP that is assigned by the router.
When paying for an internet subscription, the provider assigns an IP to the subscriber which can dynamically change.
The router, also functioning as a DHCP server (see the guide to DHCP to assign IP manually or automatically), assigns computers the IPs to go to the internet and then, through NAT (Network translation technology), manipulates them so that if even the internet provider would change the assigned IP, there would still be no problems.
As seen, some telephone companies allow you to activate fixed IP (for example see how to ask Fastweb for free public fixed IP) so that you can use it for server applications on your computers.
The issue of assigning IPs is very complex because when only IPv4s existed, these were numerically limited for all the computers in the world and the network managers had to find conventions and trickery.
We had talked about this in more detail, in the article that explains how we connect to the internet and why with the same Public IP.
From an IP address it is certainly possible to trace its geographical origin, even if not precisely.
There are, however, two problems in this attempt at tracing.
First of all, client computers, those that are not servers, do not have a fixed and public IP address reachable from the internet.
At the limit, that address we know may be that of the router, which then may have been assigned in a shared way to other people around the country.
Also, unlike phone numbers that have a country code, IP addresses are assigned to companies rather than countries, so there is no indication of where the numbers come from.
Using tools capable of extracting information from an IP address, it is possible only to have an estimate of where the user is and to know which telephone company he uses to connect to the internet.
We talked about these tools in the guide on how to find the IP address of another computer, where we reported the Whtasmyipaddress.com site, capable of telling us where the IP address is from and the internet provider.
With this site you can find out my IP .
By connecting to the site, it automatically detects our IPv4 and IPv6 and tells us in which city we are and which company we are subscribed to.
Keep in mind that with the dynamic IP addresses, which we mentioned above, every time the router is reset or restarted it acquires a new IP address from the internet provider (unless a static IP has been requested) therefore the address IP will change on the computer.
In addition, the same IP can be shared and used in multiple homes, whether it is a VPN connection or a corporate network.
To reach a site, however, you do not have to type the IP of the server on the browser, but just write the address of the site, which is easy to remember (such as www.navigaweb.net).
To make sure that typing www.google.it, the computer connects correctly to the server where Google is located, we think the DNS servers (Domain Name System), which use an address book associating IP and names.
We have seen, in another article, how to get faster DNS servers, explaining in more detail what they are.
In theory it is also possible to assign a DNS to the IP of the computer, to connect to it from the outside.
He first discovers the IP used by that person by asking the site where he committed the crime to report it.
Then he asks the internet provider who the IP was assigned to.
If the offense is of a serious severity, then the internet provider and the site will be forced by law to provide such information.
Through the VPN the data traffic of the computer is encrypted, it passes it to the VPN that sends the request on the website.
Nobody, not even the telephone company, will know which site is visited by that computer.
If someone tries to trace the origin of the IP, they will see the VPN address and not the one of the used computer.
To deepen the discussion, I refer to the guide to surf anonymously on the Internet with proxies, vpn and fake IP addresses and on how to hide the IP address on PC, Android and iPhone
In another article we had tried a working trick to track down the IP from Whatsapp, Facebook or an Email.
READ ALSO: Great Guide on LAN computer networks, internet and wifi
In general terms, two computers communicate with each other through their IP addresses, so the IP address is therefore necessary for the server computers that host the websites to know where to send their data.
The reason why it is important to know what an IP address is, is not only cultural, but also very practical, to solve problems with the network and with the internet and, above all, to understand if our privacy is at risk or, in others words, if anyone can know who we are and where we are in the world using the IP address.
Given the technical vastness of the topic, this is a very simplified summary article that leads us to understand what an IP address is in broad terms, what it is used for and, above all, how important it is for privacy .
Article Index
- What is an IP address "> Types of IP addresses
- How IPs are assigned to computers
- What can be discovered from an IP address
- Check what websites visited by the computer's IP address know about us
- The IP addresses of the websites
- How does the police find a person's address from the IP or from visiting a site
- How to hide an IP address
- Find out an IP address
What is an IP address?
IP stands for " Internet Protocol ", so the IP address is an address from which the computer sends and receives data.As mentioned above, IP addresses can be imagined as if they were street addresses of the Internet country.
The IP addresses of computers are made up of numbers and every site, computer or server in the world, when connected to the internet, is assigned an IP address, random or fixed by whoever manages it.
When you go to upload a website to Chrome, the computer sends a request to the IP address of the server where the website is located and downloads its content.
The website then sends its content to the PC using the computer's IP address.
The operation is very similar to sending a postcard to someone, on which the home address is written so that the postman can deliver it correctly.
Types of IP addresses
IP addresses are of two types:IPv4, the standard version currently used, made up of 4 series of numbers ranging from or to 255, for example: 2.34.211.123
IPv6, the most recent version, made up of 8 groups of 4 hexadecimal digits (the rules are much more complex and are virtually infinite).
How IPs are assigned to computers
Computers on the internet differ in two broad categories, clients and servers.Servers are computers that share resources on the network or on the Internet, clients are PCs or smartphones that connect to servers to download data or view websites (in the case of web servers).
The servers have a fixed IP, the home PC and the smartphone, on the other hand, have a dynamic IP that is assigned by the router.
When paying for an internet subscription, the provider assigns an IP to the subscriber which can dynamically change.
The router, also functioning as a DHCP server (see the guide to DHCP to assign IP manually or automatically), assigns computers the IPs to go to the internet and then, through NAT (Network translation technology), manipulates them so that if even the internet provider would change the assigned IP, there would still be no problems.
As seen, some telephone companies allow you to activate fixed IP (for example see how to ask Fastweb for free public fixed IP) so that you can use it for server applications on your computers.
The issue of assigning IPs is very complex because when only IPv4s existed, these were numerically limited for all the computers in the world and the network managers had to find conventions and trickery.
We had talked about this in more detail, in the article that explains how we connect to the internet and why with the same Public IP.
What can be discovered from an IP address
Having someone's IP address, could we connect to his computer or could we know where he is?From an IP address it is certainly possible to trace its geographical origin, even if not precisely.
There are, however, two problems in this attempt at tracing.
First of all, client computers, those that are not servers, do not have a fixed and public IP address reachable from the internet.
At the limit, that address we know may be that of the router, which then may have been assigned in a shared way to other people around the country.
Also, unlike phone numbers that have a country code, IP addresses are assigned to companies rather than countries, so there is no indication of where the numbers come from.
Using tools capable of extracting information from an IP address, it is possible only to have an estimate of where the user is and to know which telephone company he uses to connect to the internet.
Check what websites visited by the computer's IP address know about us
To find out what information can be found about us based on the IP address of our PC that we use to browse the internet, there are some online tools.We talked about these tools in the guide on how to find the IP address of another computer, where we reported the Whtasmyipaddress.com site, capable of telling us where the IP address is from and the internet provider.
With this site you can find out my IP .
By connecting to the site, it automatically detects our IPv4 and IPv6 and tells us in which city we are and which company we are subscribed to.
Keep in mind that with the dynamic IP addresses, which we mentioned above, every time the router is reset or restarted it acquires a new IP address from the internet provider (unless a static IP has been requested) therefore the address IP will change on the computer.
In addition, the same IP can be shared and used in multiple homes, whether it is a VPN connection or a corporate network.
The IP addresses of the websites
As we have briefly explained, the websites are hosted by servers, i.e. by computers that can be reached on the Internet from all over the world.To reach a site, however, you do not have to type the IP of the server on the browser, but just write the address of the site, which is easy to remember (such as www.navigaweb.net).
To make sure that typing www.google.it, the computer connects correctly to the server where Google is located, we think the DNS servers (Domain Name System), which use an address book associating IP and names.
We have seen, in another article, how to get faster DNS servers, explaining in more detail what they are.
In theory it is also possible to assign a DNS to the IP of the computer, to connect to it from the outside.
How does the police find a person's address from the IP or from visiting a site
If a person commits an online crime such as that of threatening someone with a death by message, this can be traced by the Italian or other countries' postal police in two steps:He first discovers the IP used by that person by asking the site where he committed the crime to report it.
Then he asks the internet provider who the IP was assigned to.
If the offense is of a serious severity, then the internet provider and the site will be forced by law to provide such information.
How to hide an IP address
If you want to hide the IP, the geographical origin and also the company that provides the internet to our computer or mobile phone, the easiest way is to use a VPN, which disguises the IP and makes it seem like the connection from a different country .Through the VPN the data traffic of the computer is encrypted, it passes it to the VPN that sends the request on the website.
Nobody, not even the telephone company, will know which site is visited by that computer.
If someone tries to trace the origin of the IP, they will see the VPN address and not the one of the used computer.
To deepen the discussion, I refer to the guide to surf anonymously on the Internet with proxies, vpn and fake IP addresses and on how to hide the IP address on PC, Android and iPhone
Find out an IP address
It's not that easy to find out the IP of another computer on the network and you need to devise some hacker trick to do it.In another article we had tried a working trick to track down the IP from Whatsapp, Facebook or an Email.
READ ALSO: Great Guide on LAN computer networks, internet and wifi
