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I checked my Google notifications and it's saying I accessed my Samsung phone from an IP address in a city I neither live in or have visited recently. How do I look up who or what it belongs to?

2600:1005:b024:9415:3cb9:b744:7818:2792 out of Macon, GA 2600:1005:b012:f21d:2ce0:48d5:ae8d:d587 out of Atlanta, GA

Arjan
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Denise
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1 Answers1

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The given IP addresses belong to Verizon Mobile. So, you've probably been assigned those IP addresses yourself when you were using your phone.

Your mobile provider could always give you the same, "static", IPv6 address, but it seems Verizon wants US$ 500 for that. (I'm not sure if this is only supported for their USB modems, or also for phones.) Without such static IP address you're sharing a "dynamic" address with others, and that could even change when moving from one cell tower to the other. You can investigate yourself using websites such as whatismyip.com in the browser on your telephone.

Finding the location for static IP addresses is already hard. But for dynamic IP addresses on mobile networks, chances are even bigger that Google shows you the wrong location. Like, wild guesses:

  • It might map the IP address to the known location of some data center from which the IP address is "connected" to the internet. Verizon might have several locations at which this happens.
  • It might show the known or guessed location of someone else who was assigned the very same IP address at some earlier time.
Arjan
  • 31,163
  • "but it seems Verizon wants US$ 500 for that" snort. Clearly they're trying to make the most of a scarce resource. – Journeyman Geek Aug 10 '15 at 10:00
  • Should probably add that IP addresses don't inherently have any kind of location so all IP => location lookups are "wild guesses". Some wilder than others. – qasdfdsaq Aug 10 '15 at 10:33