[Fox07]

A few of us on another forum are a bit confused about Ip addresses. The person concerned was accused of making multiple accounts but she says she runs a forum of her own and another person on the forum shares the same ip address with 3 different people. How do you know if you have a static ip address or a dynamic one? Also another forum admin says that a few of us on there share an ip address. How can certain forums ban ip addresses if other people share them- I always thought everyone had a different one.

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On a simple level, there are two types of IP address: Internal and External.

Your external IP address is given to you by your Internet Provider, this is what web forums and what not see.

Your internal IP address is given to your computer by your router. This device allows you to have many computers plugged into it. Your computer goes on the internet through this device. Therefore your external IP address is still seen by web forums and what not, but your computers are sharing the same connection, hence why you'll all appear to have the same IP address despite being on different computers connected to the same router.

Whether IPs are static or dynamic depends on the settings. Internal IPs you can set this up yourself, External IPs are down to your internet provider's policies. Most often they're dynamic as well.

Edited by Neil Jones, 04 March 2007 - 03:05 PM.

[Neil Jones]

On a simple level, there are two types of IP address: Internal and External.

Your external IP address is given to you by your Internet Provider, this is what web forums and what not see.

Your internal IP address is given to your computer by your router. This device allows you to have many computers plugged into it. Your computer goes on the internet through this device. Therefore your external IP address is still seen by web forums and what not, but your computers are sharing the same connection, hence why you'll all appear to have the same IP address despite being on different computers connected to the same router.

Whether IPs are static or dynamic depends on the settings. Internal IPs you can set this up yourself, External IPs are down to your internet provider's policies. Most often they're dynamic as well.

Edited by Neil Jones, 04 March 2007 - 03:05 PM.

[Tyger]

The day of the "fixed" IP is just about over for the individual computer user for several reasons. One is that many service providers are short of IPs so when one user logs off for a while his IP may be given out to another. Another is that it makes it more difficult, nearly imossible in fact, for the home user to set up a traffic hungry server. Also it makes it less possible for someone to hack the home user's machine, providing him some benefit as well.

All this being noted it doesn't seem very sensible to ban anyone according to their IP, neither fair or effective.

[Fox07]

Thanks for explaining Neil. I have found out that mine changes because someone give me a link that tells you what your ip address is and its different than what it was two days ago.

[Fox07]

Thanks Tyger Yes I agree it doesn't seem fair to ban somebodys IP does it.