How do I know my IP Address ?

What is my public IP Address ?

There are different ways of knowing your public IP address, but they vary widely depending on the operating system (Windows, Linux, MacOS, Android, iOS, etc.).

The easiest and fastest way to find your IP is therefore to use a website which will give you your public IP address in no time.

Your IP address is : [display_ip]

How to locate an IP address ?

It is also possible to geolocate an IP, ie to display on a map the country, the region, the city and the address of the device connected to the internet.

Be careful however, locating an IP address is not an exact science: it is thus easy to obtain an IP address which will not correspond to its real geolocation for example a proxy. The database which establishes the correlation between IP and physical address can also be erroneous, inaccurate or outdated. As a result, your location information may turn out to be inaccurate or completely false!

There are of course many websites offering the same functionality as well as command line tools to locate your IP address (but why be complicated when simplicity is at hand)!

Here is a selection of a few websites allowing you to know your public IP address via your internet browser.

They will also give you all the additional information, such as the hostname associated with your IP address:

http://whatismyipaddress.com
https://www.whatismyip.com
https://www.iplocation.net

What is a public IP Address ?

IP is an abbreviation which means Internet Protocol.

A public IP address is the unique address that identifies your computer (or any other device connected to the Internet, such as a smartphone, a tablet or even a connected object).

Your public IP is different from your local IP address which is the unique connection address of your computer in your local network (internal local network, located for example at your work or your home).

Many websites and digital online services use the IP address to geolocate or even restrict their functionality to certain regions of the world.  YouTube, for example, uses your IP to determine whether or not you can access certain video content that is reserved for a specific country. Fortunately, it is possible to bypass this filtering (read how to to play a youtube video blocked in your country).

How is my IP assigned?

Your public IP address is assigned to you by your F.A.I (Internet Service Provider) through which you connect to the internet. It is mostly fixed (basically, you always keep the same IP as long as you keep your F.A.I).

IP address types

There are two specific standards for IP:

IPv4 address

It consists of a series of 4 numbers between 0 and 255 separated by dot “.”.
It is still the most commonly used standard today, but it is limited by the number of devices connected simultaneously (4,294,967,296) to the internet at a time when the need for addresses is increasing.

Example of IPv4 address: 88.232.28.174

IPv6 address

It consists of 8 hexadecimal blocks of 4 bytes separated by a colon “:“.
The advantage of this standard is that it makes it possible to have many more IP addresses available (340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 possible combinations). This increase in the number of addresses has become necessary with the development of the Internet and the number of connected devices (computers, smartphones, tablets, connected objects).

Example of IPv6 address: 3bec: c504: 3127: 5800: 10c3: 30bf: cb2f: 1eee

For more information on IP addresses, see the full article dedicated to the subject on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_address

How to hide your IP Address ?

It is entirely possible to hide your public IP address. Or at least use a different IP than yours using one of these means:

  • Use a proxy. The proxy IP will then be detected, not yours.
  • Go through a VPN to hide its real IP. Discover the reasons for using a VPN in this additional article.
  • Surfing via the TOR network allows you to browse the web with a different IP than yours in order to anonymize internet exchanges.
  • Connect via a public WIFI network.

Why want to hide your IP?

You may not want to be able to locate yourself, limit prospecting, or have your activities not recorded on the web.

This is especially true in countries where internet surveillance is important and where web censorship does not allow you to access all websites. Using a different IP than your address can thus allow access to prohibited sites (for example watching a YouTube video blocked in your country) and / or avoid surveillance by an authoritarian government.

But let’s be honest: the goal when you want to hide your IP can also be access to free streaming platforms and the illegal downloading of works protected by copyright: music, films, videos, images, software etc…

How do i find my local IP Address?

The local IP address is the address of your device in your local network which is different from your public IP.

It is possible to know your local ip by following this tutorial for Windows 10:

  1. Right click on the Windows 10 Start menu at the bottom left of the screen then click on Command Prompt (or PowerShell on the most recent versions of Windows 10).
  2. Type in the command prompt cmd /k ipconfig
  3. In the display results, look for Wireless network card if you are connected to your local network by WIFI or Ethernet card Connection if you are connected via an ethernet cable. Your local IP will be displayed in IPv4 or IPv6 format.

find-local-ip-with-cmd

 

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