8 ms·

How the heck did it automatically pan the map to my current location, my small town, in an Incognito window, on page load? Is IP geolocation this accurate and

How the heck did it automatically pan the map to my current location, my small town, in an Incognito window, on page load? Is IP geolocation this accurate and accessible to every website nowadays? If this website can do this I assume every website I visit can do it too?

mcslambley 2y ago
I can't speak for this website specifically but Cloudflare makes it pretty easy to geolocate users based on request headers.
xp84 2y ago
It is very cheap and easy. Even the free versions of the database available from maxmind are plenty accurate for town level. At my last job, I built a little docker image that used the free maxmind DB and kept it up to date, and ran a node server which returned some JSON telling estimated lat/long, city name, country, etc.
- regularfry 2y ago
  Cheap, easy, and wrong. It puts me a clear 800km away from where I'm actually sitting, and I'm sitting in a major UK city. It's put me on the wrong continent before now. That was fun.
  - littlestymaar 2y ago
    > It's put me on the wrong continent before now What did you expect after leaving Europe? /s
  - wesamco 2y ago
    I guess the accuracy really depends on your location or ISP. I believe my ISP rarely or never rotates IP addresses, and on top of that I think my ISP provided router is assigned an IPv6 address and it prioritizes using it, because when I visit whatismyipaddress.com with JS disabled, it can only show my IPv6 address, but if I enable JS it can show an IPv4 address too (I assume through the WebRTC IP leak method, which requires JS)
    - xp84 2y ago
      When I built the thing I mentioned, and even if i did so now, I'd just not make an AAAA record for it, because it's still safe to assume ipv4 connectivity exists (and not just via some remote proxy or something), and I think at least the database I had access to was for ipv4. I don't think they need any hackery to get your IPv4, they just need a separate hostname configured that they can fetch from, which only has an ipv4 (A) record.
  - mynameisvlad 2y ago
    Cheap, easy, and generally correct for the majority of people* Just because it’s 800km off for your IP does not mean it’s 800km off for every IP and Maxmind is generally considered one of the reliable providers of this information.
  - reincoder 2y ago
    Where do we locate you? https://ipinfo.io/ https://ipinfo.io/ If the location data is incorrect, you can always submit a correction with us: https://ipinfo.io/corrections https://ipinfo.io/corrections
    - regularfry 2y ago
      Better! Still 200km out, but better!
      - reincoder 2y ago
        200 KM means there is room for improvement. If you reach out to support and provide a correction, that will be quite helpful. If you mention that you came from HN, I can report back on why we had such a deviation.
    - Moru 2y ago
      Mine was about 600 km wrong but the correct country at least. It's reporting the ISP's location but it's a country wide ISP.
      - reincoder 2y ago
        If you reach out to support and drop a correction with us, that will be quite helpful. This is an unusually high deviation, so we would like to investigate it.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
davidmurdoch 2y ago
I thought the same. It's the first time I've ever seen IP geolocation get my home IP address correct. It usually thinks I'm in North Carolina (I'm in Florida).
- hoosieree 2y ago
  Same here. But knowing my ISP, it'll change throughout the day, sometimes by quite a lot.
ale42 2y ago
You should probably try what one of the few online demos of IP geolocation tell about your IP... (just to cite one among many, quality varies a lot across services and geographic zones: https://www.maxmind.com/en/locate-my-ip-address https://www.maxmind.com/en/locate-my-ip-address)
- Retric 2y ago
  That’s narrowing things down to a 200km radius for me and while I am within that circle it’s center is over 100km from me.
- pavon 2y ago
  Interesting. I have a static IP, and have kept that same IP through multiple moves around the state, but it knows my current zip code. I wonder if that is because my ISP shares the zip code, or through association with data collected from other sites. And yet every site that uses IP geolocation for useful purposes thinks I'm in a completely different state that bounces around every few months, if I don't let the browser share my location.
  - reincoder 2y ago
    I work for IPinfo.io (feel free to check your location data with us to see if we are correct as well). It is most likely that your ISP is sharing your zip code via a WHOIS/geofeed record.
    - ceinewydd 2y ago
      For me, Firefox and without iCloud Private Relay engaged, Maxmind is within about 2km and doesn't get the city correct (but we're right on a border), and IPinfo is about 15km as the crow flies (and gets the city entirely wrong).
      - reincoder 2y ago
        That is very unfortunate. If you reach out to support and drop a correction with us, that will be quite helpful.
BurningFrog 2y ago
FWIW it placed me 10 miles away. Right city, completely wrong part. Maybe that's where my ISP has their connection?
LeifCarrotson 2y ago
Geo-IP through Cloudflare: <script id="cflocation"> window.CFLocation = {"lat":####,"lng":####};window.CFDsm=null; </script> See https://developers.cloudflare.com/network/ip-geolocation/ https://developers.cloudflare.com/network/ip-geolocation/. Mine's off by more than 100 miles (Comcast Business fiber), it's not magic.
- aeyes 2y ago
  Cloudflare only gives you the country
  - lights0123 2y ago
    No. https://developers.cloudflare.com/rules/transform/managed-transforms/reference/#add-visitor-location-headers https://developers.cloudflare.com/rules/transform/managed-tr...
  - irrational 2y ago
    Then how did the website end up just about a mile from my house?
- tills13 2y ago
  It's probably either just the lat long of the PoP or some magic based connection latency?
moogleii 2y ago
A VPN should help with that. E.g. for the Mac folks, Private Relay on vs off was a delta of about 100 city blocks for me.
shepherdjerred 2y ago
That is crazy. Even Google Maps isn't this accurate for me with location turned off.
antod 2y ago
Mine started in a different city about 520km away. And I wasn't incognito. Probably a lot more to do with your country, your ISP or coincidence than anything else.

mcslambley 2y ago

I can't speak for this website specifically but Cloudflare makes it pretty easy to geolocate users based on request headers.

xp84 2y ago

It is very cheap and easy. Even the free versions of the database available from maxmind are plenty accurate for town level. At my last job, I built a little docker image that used the free maxmind DB and kept it up to date, and ran a node server which returned some JSON telling estimated lat/long, city name, country, etc.

regularfry 2y ago
Cheap, easy, and wrong. It puts me a clear 800km away from where I'm actually sitting, and I'm sitting in a major UK city. It's put me on the wrong continent before now. That was fun.
- littlestymaar 2y ago
  > It's put me on the wrong continent before now What did you expect after leaving Europe? /s
- wesamco 2y ago
  I guess the accuracy really depends on your location or ISP. I believe my ISP rarely or never rotates IP addresses, and on top of that I think my ISP provided router is assigned an IPv6 address and it prioritizes using it, because when I visit whatismyipaddress.com with JS disabled, it can only show my IPv6 address, but if I enable JS it can show an IPv4 address too (I assume through the WebRTC IP leak method, which requires JS)
  - xp84 2y ago
    When I built the thing I mentioned, and even if i did so now, I'd just not make an AAAA record for it, because it's still safe to assume ipv4 connectivity exists (and not just via some remote proxy or something), and I think at least the database I had access to was for ipv4. I don't think they need any hackery to get your IPv4, they just need a separate hostname configured that they can fetch from, which only has an ipv4 (A) record.
- mynameisvlad 2y ago
  Cheap, easy, and generally correct for the majority of people* Just because it’s 800km off for your IP does not mean it’s 800km off for every IP and Maxmind is generally considered one of the reliable providers of this information.
- reincoder 2y ago
  Where do we locate you? https://ipinfo.io/ https://ipinfo.io/ If the location data is incorrect, you can always submit a correction with us: https://ipinfo.io/corrections https://ipinfo.io/corrections
  - regularfry 2y ago
    Better! Still 200km out, but better!
    - reincoder 2y ago
      200 KM means there is room for improvement. If you reach out to support and provide a correction, that will be quite helpful. If you mention that you came from HN, I can report back on why we had such a deviation.
  - Moru 2y ago
    Mine was about 600 km wrong but the correct country at least. It's reporting the ISP's location but it's a country wide ISP.
    - reincoder 2y ago
      If you reach out to support and drop a correction with us, that will be quite helpful. This is an unusually high deviation, so we would like to investigate it.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

davidmurdoch 2y ago

I thought the same. It's the first time I've ever seen IP geolocation get my home IP address correct. It usually thinks I'm in North Carolina (I'm in Florida).

hoosieree 2y ago
Same here. But knowing my ISP, it'll change throughout the day, sometimes by quite a lot.

ale42 2y ago

You should probably try what one of the few online demos of IP geolocation tell about your IP... (just to cite one among many, quality varies a lot across services and geographic zones: https://www.maxmind.com/en/locate-my-ip-address https://www.maxmind.com/en/locate-my-ip-address)

Retric 2y ago
That’s narrowing things down to a 200km radius for me and while I am within that circle it’s center is over 100km from me.
pavon 2y ago
Interesting. I have a static IP, and have kept that same IP through multiple moves around the state, but it knows my current zip code. I wonder if that is because my ISP shares the zip code, or through association with data collected from other sites. And yet every site that uses IP geolocation for useful purposes thinks I'm in a completely different state that bounces around every few months, if I don't let the browser share my location.
- reincoder 2y ago
  I work for IPinfo.io (feel free to check your location data with us to see if we are correct as well). It is most likely that your ISP is sharing your zip code via a WHOIS/geofeed record.
  - ceinewydd 2y ago
    For me, Firefox and without iCloud Private Relay engaged, Maxmind is within about 2km and doesn't get the city correct (but we're right on a border), and IPinfo is about 15km as the crow flies (and gets the city entirely wrong).
    - reincoder 2y ago
      That is very unfortunate. If you reach out to support and drop a correction with us, that will be quite helpful.

BurningFrog 2y ago

FWIW it placed me 10 miles away. Right city, completely wrong part. Maybe that's where my ISP has their connection?

LeifCarrotson 2y ago

Geo-IP through Cloudflare: <script id="cflocation"> window.CFLocation = {"lat":####,"lng":####};window.CFDsm=null; </script> See https://developers.cloudflare.com/network/ip-geolocation/ https://developers.cloudflare.com/network/ip-geolocation/. Mine's off by more than 100 miles (Comcast Business fiber), it's not magic.

aeyes 2y ago
Cloudflare only gives you the country
- lights0123 2y ago
  No. https://developers.cloudflare.com/rules/transform/managed-transforms/reference/#add-visitor-location-headers https://developers.cloudflare.com/rules/transform/managed-tr...
- irrational 2y ago
  Then how did the website end up just about a mile from my house?
tills13 2y ago
It's probably either just the lat long of the PoP or some magic based connection latency?

moogleii 2y ago

A VPN should help with that. E.g. for the Mac folks, Private Relay on vs off was a delta of about 100 city blocks for me.

shepherdjerred 2y ago

That is crazy. Even Google Maps isn't this accurate for me with location turned off.

antod 2y ago

Mine started in a different city about 520km away. And I wasn't incognito. Probably a lot more to do with your country, your ISP or coincidence than anything else.