How to Hide Your IP Address
We are all individuals worthy of love, but we are also numbers. Consider: When you lot were born, you were given a proper name and a social security number. When you lot got a car, you earned a driver's license number. And when y'all get online, you receive an IP address. Most of u.s. try to keep these numbers private to protect our privacy, only your IP address is distressingly public, by default. At that place are many means to hide or change this number, such as using a VPN, and it's much easier to practise than you might think.
What's an IP Address?
Simply put, an IP address is the identifier that allows information to be sent betwixt devices on a network. Like your abode accost, it contains location information and makes devices accessible for communication.
These aren't random addresses; they're mathematically produced and allocated by the Cyberspace Assigned Numbers Dominance (IANA), a division of the Cyberspace Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). These are the aforementioned people responsible for sorting out domain names and other factors critical to cyberspace communication.
The allocation of these addresses isn't random either. IANA doesn't directly provide you with an IP address. Instead, they allocate blocks of numbers to different regions. For instance, the The states has a reported 1,541,605,760 addresses allocated to it, which is about 36 pct of all the IP addresses available (at least, under IPv4, equally opposed to IPv6, but that's a story for some other time). Meanwhile, the Vatican has a mere 17,920 addresses. This is probably more than you will ever need to know most IP addresses, only y'all can now print your friends with these handy factoids about Papal networks.
Continue It Secret, Keep It Safe
Because there's a finite number of IP addresses (4,294,967,296, nether IPv4) and only so many bachelor by location, mere mortals like you and me generally don't have to worry about our IP addresses. Our ISPs assign them to united states (and sometimes revoke and recycle them), our routers utilise them, and we continue happily along—until we need to change something.
Although very few of u.s. are actually in charge of our own IP addresses, there are some means to strength a modify. Search the internet and you find all sorts of arcane control-line magic words that volition, allegedly, get you lot a new address. There are even some websites that tin practice the aforementioned. You tin can also disconnect your modem for a period of fourth dimension, and see if your ISP assigns you a new address when you come dorsum online. Or you can call your Internet service provider straight and ask for a new address, simply that might lead to some tedious questions.
Instead of changing your IP, it'southward probably easier to only hide it.
Hide in Obviously Sight, Use a VPN
When you lot point your browser to a website, a request leaves your computer, heads off to the server where the website lives, and returns with the information you've requested. Along the style, location and identifying information is exchanged and, sometimes, intercepted by attackers, snoopers, advertisers, and nosey government agencies.
With a virtual private network, or VPN, another layer is added to the equation. Instead of contacting a website'south servers directly, the VPN creates an encrypted tunnel between y'all and the VPN service's server, which in turn connects to the public internet and retrieves the information you requested as normal. This passes back through the tunnel to your calculator, ensuring that no ane tin can intercept your web traffic, and that an observer will see the IP address of the VPN and not yours.
The best VPN services go fifty-fifty further, providing bonuses like ad blocking, malware protection, and actress protection for other devices. Some VPNs, such equally TorGuard, fifty-fifty offer static IP addresses for sale. Unlike the address assigned by your ISP or acquired by your VPN connexion, this is a permanent address, merely normally restricted to sure countries.
Using VPNs does add together an extra step to your web surfing and that generally means a slower experience. But my all-encompassing hands-on testing has shown that the top-tier VPN providers will slow you lot but marginally. If you have practiced enough connectedness, you might not even notice the deviation. Indeed, the fastest VPN I've tested actually improved upload and download speeds.
And let'south not forget your mobile devices! They accept IP addresses, likewise. And you're probably using them in a wider diverseness of locations than your home computer, including on shifty public Wi-Fi hotspots. While using a VPN on a mobile device can be a little annoying, it's proficient to at least use 1 when connecting to a network y'all don't completely trust. All the major VPN companies accept VPN apps for Android and for iPhone, too.
In full general, VPN apps are identical regardless of the platform. There are a few differences with iPhone VPN apps, however. Apple makes it slightly more difficult to utilise sure VPN protocols on iOS devices. Thankfully, developers are coming together that challenge and providing the best and near secure options for everyone.
While most of the VPN services I've reviewed have a subscription fee, some do not. In that location are many
Why the Secrecy?
At that place are many reasons to hide yourself online. IP addresses can exist used to discern your physical location, and can sometimes do so with remarkable accuracy. These addresses besides act like personal identifiers, a little like a phone number, letting advertisers and adversaries rails yous online. They can too be used to launch targeted attacks against you.
You lot may fifty-fifty be hiding from a watchful or oppressive government. Journalists are especially likely to hide their IP addresses when they're reporting in unsafe areas or on sensitive subjects. Of class, I'm non encouraging anyone to interruption local laws, but I do want people to know how to go on themselves rubber, should the need arise.
Hiding your IP address via VPN also makes information technology possible to watch region-locked content. The BBC, for example, provides free streaming if y'all alive in the United kingdom. If you want to watch from another country, only connect to a VPN server in London and your traffic will appear to be British. The same is truthful for streaming services similar Netflix, which have different content offerings depending on your country. Because of this, Netflix blocks VPNs and VPNS try to go on working to continue Netflix attainable.
Encrypting your traffic with a VPN volition also make it harder for your Internet service provider to block certain kinds of traffic. BitTorrent users, for example, may desire to use a VPN to prevent their downloads from existence blocked. Nearly VPN services permit BitTorrent traffic, and file-sharing in general, only information technology'due south not universal. Make certain you're not breaking the VPN's terms of service when you start leeching seeds.
Tor and Beyond
Fifty-fifty with a VPN, your data moves in a more-or-less straight line between your figurer and the stuff on the Cyberspace. Merely when you make your path more circuitous, you non only hide your IP address but make yourself much harder to find, too.
Tor, which is short for The Onion Router, uses a series of computers distributed across the globe to hibernate your IP accost and make your digital trail harder to follow. Instead of a single asking from betoken A (your home) to betoken B (the website'due south server) and dorsum again, your computer sends out layered requests, each one encrypted individually. You're then relayed from Tor node to Tor node (A to C to R to Z and finally to B) before finally exiting the network and reaching your destination.
Even if someone intercepted your traffic betwixt nodes, the layers of encryption ensure they could but discern the previous and next jumps, and still wouldn't know where the concatenation began or where it ended. The theory is that the assaulter would take to map your unabridged path through the Tor network in order to figure out who you are. Of course, not everything works perfectly in the existent globe, just Tor is very transparent about its limitations and actively works to amend the network.
Tor is virtually often associated with secret and seedy Night Spider web websites, like Facebook. But it'south also one of the best anonymization tools out there, and it's used every day by people concerned about security and others seeking to avoid the restrictions of oppressive authorities censorship. It's as well complimentary.
If Tor sounds like the way to go, just you lot don't want to muck effectually with relays and onion requests, just download the Tor Browser. This is a special customized version of Firefox that makes getting on Tor a snap. But although using a VPN may impact your browsing speeds, using Tor will definitely slow downward your web surfing speeds.
If the Tor Browser isn't quite your cup of tea, NordVPN too offers Tor over VPN, for extra protection. With these kind of specialized features, information technology's easy to see why it'due south an Editors' Choice winner.
There are many reasons you lot might want to hide your IP address. Fortunately at that place are besides many techniques, apps, and services that can help you lot practise it. While some of them may seem arcane and scary, they're quickly condign easier to apply and more powerful, as you lot'll see if you explore the links in this story.
Source: https://sea.pcmag.com/old-encryption/19308/how-to-hide-your-ip-address
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