question about IPs

greenspun.com : LUSENET : Gwen's Trailer Trash Forum : One Thread
Someone who knows about these things, please tell me about IPs. Are they unique to each user, or only to each server?

I ask because I recently found out that the IP of one of the trolls now posting on this forum matches the IP of someone who used to post here quite frequently and amicably. Actually, two of the trolls' IPs match those of former friendly posters.

What does it all mean? I know I'm ignorant, but I don't want to be paranoid or naive.

-- Anonymous, March 27, 2001

Answers

I always thought they were unique to the user. It's too much of a coincidence for it not to be.

-- Anonymous, March 27, 2001
IP addresses are assigned by the server at the time you dial up to your ISP (internet service provider). Each ISP has a block of IP addresses that it assigns out randomly to each user each time they dial up. So basically, anybody who uses that ISP (like AOL, Earthlink, etc) can be given any IP address from that block every time they dial up. With dial up accounts, the IP address is usually different everytime they connect.

If a user has a dedicated service (cable, dsl) they may or may not keep the same IP address all the time based on how their provider does business. So, just to clarify, just because two posters come up with the same or very similar IP address does not mean they are the same person. Let's not turn this into a witch-hunt.

-- Anonymous, March 27, 2001

It could mean that the friendly poster lives in the same telephone area code, dialing into the same ISP, as the Impotence Revenge Squad, or it could mean that Mr. IRS has always been pretending to be the friendly poster you mention.

Don't sweat this Gwen. You can't punish this clown more than he's punishing himself. Hate destroys the hater. That's why he tries to make you hate him.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Yes, if they are using the same service provider, it is possible that two different people seem to be coming in from the same IP address. To look up what an IP address is, you can enter it at http://www.arin.net/whois/index.html and it will tell you exactly where that IP address is registered.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Susan, who said this was a witch hunt? People are trolling the boards, and Gwen wants to find out who it is.

I would find it very odd that someone who just happens to have the same IP server in the same city would NOT be the same person who was a friendly poster turned nasty poster. Or it could be a friend of that poster who was asked to post nasty shit.

Gwen, maybe you can contact the internet provider from that IP address and see if they can help you find out who are the trolls?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Nicole, I understand Gwen's need to find out who is doing this. However, tensions are running high right now and it would be far too easy to run with the "it can't be a coincidence" idea and accuse people unjustly. Thousands of people in the same city could have the same IP server.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
I'm technically naive too, but can't greenspun.com help get identify the troll(s) too, considering they host the board? They must have a stake in insuring that their boards don't fall victim to this kind of crap, and it stands to reason that the trolls can easily access their other discussion groups.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
it is a witch hunt susan is correct. to bad that you feel the need to find out who is who. further proof of censorship. many boards have the same problem, perhaps password protection is in order. that would help you to censor more. you stated someone who used to post amicably? what happenened to them? did you falsely accuse them too and run them off? good luck toots, you will need it greenspun has alot beter things to do then help in your professed witch hunt.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Gwen, maybe you can contact the internet provider from that IP address and see if they can help you find out who are the trolls?

oh dear dumb nicole, that is confidential info. anyway i thought you had it all figured out. it is james isnt it?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Yeah, confidential unless the user takes part in abusive or *harrassing* behaviour.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
gwen, it looks like your question has already been answered but just to back up what someone said, I have Road Runner at home (cable modem) and we do have assigned IP addresses.. according to the tech person who came to my house.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
If someone is abusing your forum from a particular IP address (and they tend to be fairly specific if they are static IPs--i.e., statistically, the chances of a forum with less than 100 total participants having two obnoxious posters with the same poor grasp of grammar and spelling and inability to tolerate being disagreed with coming from the same IP address is astronomically slim, albeit possible), it doesn't matter if it is a new or old poster. A reputable ISP will no doubt be interested in any TOS violations, as users who abuse from a particular ISP give their business a bad name, and I think harrassment usually counts as a TOS violation. If you decide to pursue the problem, then I'd stick to mentioning only the current abuses and not bring up any former ones, just to err on the side of caution.

Sites that may be useful, in the meantime:
Tell me more about tracing routes (almost anyone can do a trace route on the IP address number and post the company or ISP the individual is posting on. "Determining the origin of a packet on the Internet is usually as simple as inspecting the packet and extracting the source address. The ownership of the address can then be determined by using the "whois" program to interrogate the regional registry databases that describe IP address allocations."): http://www.linx.net/noncore/bcp/traceability-bcp.thtml
Scripts that help manage site traffic (etc.): http://www.hotscripts.com/ASP/Scripts_and_Components/Networking_Tools/ DNS/
That's a start. Hope it helps.


-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Sorry for the bad link for "Domain Names", but you can get the info from the prior link, anyway.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Only the last part of the IP address is unique. An IP address is a series of numbers like this ###.###.###.### The last three spots are unique to the user the rest denote the server. This person who is trolling has violated their agreement with their ISP. I can guarantee it. There are things you are not allowed to do. If you need an example you can read one here for AOL http://www.aol.com/copy right/rules.html.

So let me put this simply, Captain Insano. You broke the rules. You cannot hide behind anonymity anymore. All Gwen has to do is give the IP address, date and approx. time of the post to the appropriate ISP and maybe some proof of abuse and they will take corrective action. Because, you see, in the real world there are consequences for your actions.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Milla, could you re-write that in English?

So, if she just reported the abuse to troll's ISP, they would be able to figure out who it is?

Is that the way the FBI or whoever track down hackers? I find this all very facinating.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

D'oh! Nevermind. Travis answered my question.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
now it is captain insano. as for the tos reports and such, then each one of us could go ahead and trace each and every response to the post of the annonymous one and therefore, ALL and i mean all will be in violation. are we all up to the challenge? remembering of course, if you falsely accuse someone there can be legal ramifications involved. Do correct me if i'm wrong.

as for harrassment, i dont think so, this an uncensored board, define harrassment? there are no rules, read the about section. you are treading on thin ice, and have no idea of which you speak travis.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

censor, n. One authorized to examine books, films, or other material and remove or suppress what is considered objectionable. v. To examine and expurgate.

it is a witch hunt susan is correct. to bad that you feel the need to find out who is who. further proof of censorship.

You really are proof that there's no cure for willfully stupidity. If you are accused of a crime in the US, you have the right to know who your accuser is. Why? Because, otherwise, there's no defense against a personal agenda. People point out how stupid you are, and instead of considering that it's true, you compound the stupidity by, one, blaming them, and, two, you make make your accusations from hiding. You aren't being censored, dumbass. You've just had the pretense stripped from your dumbass lifestyle, and have been revealed to everyone as a fraud in Dante's Hell, trying to hide in filth. You could leave the filth, but your inability to take responsibility is further proof that you don't have the spine to do so. Everyone knows your home is hell, and know they know why.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

victimizes, harasses, degrades, or intimidates an individual or group of individuals on the basis of religion, gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, age, or disability;

Here is rule#2, to wit, if any of you posting has aol, as travis has pointed out, READ the rules, we and again i say WE are all guilty.

So in all fairness, who would have the pot call the kettle black?

Each and almost everyone one of you look in the archives are guilty, but because gwen falsely accused someone to begin with, the witchhunt is on. Hipocritical? To say the very least. Each one of you have accused james, someone named captain insano, paul, to name of few. It would appear alot of you are guilty of this. Do correct me if i'm wrong, and is there anyone of you who will admit that this is being hipocritical? nah, i didnt think so.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

First you say your being censored, then you say this is an uncensored board. You really are backed into a corner, aren't you?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
As I understand it, harassment is also defined in several state/province/federal laws - all of which apply equally to written threats and harassing behaviour.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
A crime? what the heck are you talking bout mikey? why get your thongs in a bunch? I'm not the one trying to track people down on the internet, you are. I guess I really aint as dumb as i sound.

I ask because I recently found out that the IP of one of the trolls now posting on this forum matches the IP of someone who used to post here quite frequently and amicably. Actually, two of the trolls' IPs match those of former friendly posters

them up there are gwens words, even she has not accused anyone of a crime. she lied, but no crime there.

if 2 match as friendly posters, reveal them.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

I'll try. English IS my second language, after all.

Okay. If part of a string or set (like a string of numbers) is unique, it makes the entire string unique. It's like a street address, but read backwards. Yes, the first few numbers denote a larger group, much like putting someone's state and then city on a letter. Yes, a lot of people live in the same state (or have the same numbers at the beginning of their IP address), therefore that PART of the IP address is not unique. The unique bits of the IP address are at the end of the string or set, and those last few numbers narrow it down to user groups and individual machines.

If your troll is posting from a public terminal, they can put off being busted a little longer, but eventually, once you locate the machine or machines used, you find your culprit and voila.

Actually, back in the day, I helped moderate newsgroups and listservs and I'd guesstimate that about three dozen people lost their internet access and a handful were repremanded (or worse) by their employers or universities. They made the mistake of assuming that their actions had no consequences, and that the web was a free-for-all where they could do as they liked and indulge in their most base and obnoxious and abusive urges without being held accountable, and their companies and schools begged to differ. (I have to say that these were major-league @$$hole$, however, and Gwen's troll isn't anywhere near that talented at being obnoxious, comparatively. At least not yet.)

These days it is easier to get another ISP (in most areas), but it is also much easier to get a quick response to a complaint because ISPs--especially the larger ones--are also much less tolerant of abuse. They don't have to hold on to every user in order to make a profit anymore, and the demand for Internet access is high enough that they don't want to bother wasting manhours and resources fielding complaints about troublemakers.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Gwen, you might want to check with your host to see if you can just block certain users (ISPs) from your board. I'm not sure exactly how it works, but I'll bet it's doable.

It's your business, Gwen, and Greenspun is the provider of a service to you, the client. Let them help you do what you want to do.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

I ain't Mikey, and since you were spouting that because this is an open forum there is no adequate definition of harassment. Well, in that case, the next best definition is supplied by law. You tread carefully.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Thanks! Sorry for all the dumb questions, but I don't know anything about this kind of stuff. You're pretty much saying what Travis said, right?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Robyn has a point. It is possible to block certain IPs, and that might solve your problems. If Greenspun provides this service, then you don't have to bother with setting it up yourself, hooray, and once your firewall or filter is up, then your troll[s] can post all he/they like[s], and the posts will all go into a void, unread. You then no longer have to provide a free service to someone who neither appreciates it nor contributes intelligently to it.

I personally would be loathe to continue to host a guest who keeps $h!tt!ng on my living room rug and then throwing that poo at other guests, but that's just me.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

There is no such thing as a dumb question. I wouldn't use that adjective at all.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
A crime? what the heck are you talking bout mikey? why get your thongs in a bunch? I'm not the one trying to track people down on the internet, you are.

If you aren't doing anything wrong, why don't you come clean? Because you are venting from a hidden agenda, and to come clean would be an act of responsibility, something that would lead you out of your beloved filth.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

As I understand it, harassment is also defined in several state/province/federal laws - all of which apply equally to written threats and harassing behaviour.

Show me, show me where i have threatened anyone? i've been threatened, that much is true, by Mike himself. and let us do talk about harassing shall we? where have i harrassed anyone? by posting. right. rude, many here have been rude, as gwen said in her own words, there are more than one and that is true, alot of people on here could very well meet your description kate. MANY.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

ok, then here's ANOTHER question.

I used to use Earthlink. I'm pretty sure their server was in CA and I'm in TX. So if someone check my IP, would I show up in CA or TX? Is that where the dial up number comes into play?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Show me one single threat I've issued, person inqiring about my penis?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Mike why dont you admit to threatening me? you are the one who is trying to follow me around and find out who i am. tell me i'm wrong.

NOT.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Harassment - hmmm, flooding boards with inflamatory, insulting posts. That would be harassment (and retaliation by any other posters would be self defence). Calling degrading names (fat whore, for example), that would be harassment. Sending someone a photo and then using this forum to vent your scorn at being rejected, that would be harassment.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Shelly, national ISPs generally install servers local to their subscribers. They may be networked to the server in CA, but I'm guessing they have a server near you.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Mike why dont you admit to threatening me? you are the one who is trying to follow me around and find out who i am. tell me i'm wrong.

That's not threatening you, dumbass.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Thanks, Mike.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
dumbass, mike just called me a dumbass. unprovoked, but that is okay.

I am trying to make a point here, you all need to look at yourselves and the way you are behaving as well. i never and i mean never called anyone a fat whore. that is mean and i would not do that. i have not sent anyone a pic either. mainly because i am overweight myself and not proud of my body.

mike you are a mean person you need support from your fan club, okay, i understand this. but right now this is a discussion and i am tired of you trying to find out who i am. tell me one thing, why should i tell you or anyone who i am? gwen doesnt even trust her own email or new members, but i am crazy? dont think so.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

(Using *your* logic here), okay, so you say that you didn't name call or send unwanted pics, but by your omission - you DO admit to flooding these boards with negative posts. You know, if you don't like it here, you claim you're being censored, then LEAVE and everyone'll be happy, perfect solution.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
In order to answer that in basic English, I need to know if you're familiar with the components of a header on an e-mail message. I don't know a better analogy, unfortunately. A header on an e-mail message, when viewed in full (i.e., not just "To" and "CC" and so on) has routing information that shows the route the e-mail message travelled along the Internet, including each machine along the way. There can be many, and they can be located in bizarre places. (Back when there were fewer heavy-duty servers, mail would bounce around the globe on occasion to go from one location and arrive at another mere miles away. It's more elegant than that now, usually.) At each the end of the list: the receiving machine (whoever got the e-mail) and the originating machine (whoever sent the e-mail). Case in point: I work for a large company that issues laptops to their employees. If an employee using a company laptop suffered a traumatic head injury and started posting racial slurs or harrassingmessages to a list serv, newsgroup or forum, our company could still determine which laptop was being used and from there, which user to fire.

I do not get paid to do IT consulting or helpdesk stuff, so I don't have better analogies at my disposal--that is as simple as I can make it, and I apologize if it is still unclear. ;) I'm no expert, after all, just a net.veteran who remembers life online before AOL and graphical web browsers, so I'm just sharing what little I know the best I can.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

...and look, Mike just said it better. *shrug* :)

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
kate i am leaving. i came here to try to make friends, not that you would believe me. but its true. i will lurk and watch you run other potential (well not you kate you are nice) new people. i wont post here no more.

i had a point to make and i have made it. look at yourselves, how each one with the exception of a few have belittled me at the very beginning. i did nothing wrong. i even tried to prove who i was and have proof of this saved on my computer. gwen's email was broke, go back to the very beginning, you will understand. IRL, im a very likable person. i am normal also, although since first coming here i've been labeled everything BUT.

i should have known a clique when i saw one. one more time, i never cussed nobody, didnt email pics and never threatened anyone.

SEARCH for the truth. you will find it.

adios.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Thanks, anyway. I knew about the headers and all, but looking at them is like reading a foreign language.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Goodbye, New1.

I hope you find a forum that you enjoy much more than this one.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Somehow, I doubt new1 will leave. Gwen's email is working again so why don't you try emailing her again from your real address?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Sowwy, Shelly. I tried! :)

When it gets to matters of Geekspeak or, well, things in general, I am extremely right-brained, so I do a lot better when I am able to draw stuff and gesticulate wildly in the air with my hands.

Uh...urm...routerthingie...widget...bang...port...protocolthingi e...

Well, hell. Ask me to define "art" or talk about Schroedinger's Cat, as it would have to be easier. ;)

Props to Mike to distilling it to something much more comprehensible.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Well, New1, if you arrive at a board at the same time as an offensive troll, and then show up on the defensive in discussions re weeding out same troll, then inevitably you will be under suspicion. If a trace finds another (others) to be posting the hateful derogatory stuff, then you have nothing to worry about/defend. There *are* other ways to keep anonymity/privacy without posting cute fake e-mail addresses.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Man, catching up with all this should have been fun, but it's annoying that someone's giving Gwen such a hard time.

But I think (unless I missed it when my eyes glazed over) that the troll is forgetting that his or her activities on this board are almost certainly forbidden by the ISP's terms of service, regardless of whether or not they are breaking any law. As such, I will cackle with glee when they either start bouncing from ISP to ISP in this puzzling, never-ending mission (to do what? Annoy us to death?) or realise that they're investing way too much time, energy and money in this silly endeavour.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Maybe someone has said this before but it bears repeating. Whether or not you have been insulting you have been disruptive. You have been asked to leave. You have no rights to post in a private place. If you were standing in my home and I asked you to leave and you refused, you would be trespassing and I would have the right to call authorities to have you removed. I don't have to have a reason to ask you to leave. While this is not exactly the same thing it is similar. By continuing to post inflammatory comments after being asked to leave you are harassing. See definition B below.

Main Entry: ha·rass Pronunciation: h&-'ras, 'har-&s Function: transitive verb Date: 1617 1 a : EXHAUST, FATIGUE b : to annoy persistently 2 : to worry and impede by repeated raids

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

I'll add something else to the IP question. When I'm at work and accessing the Web, my employer is acting as my ISP. Upstream in the direction of the main Internet backbones, my employer itself has an ISP. And when I dial into my employer's network from home, using PPP, and then surf the Web, I'm still using my employer as an ISP. For this reason, I sometimes use my employer's network access and I have my own personal account that I can use from home with another ISP that has nothing at all to do with my employer, should something ever happen to my work situation. Anyway, when I'm surfing via my employer's Internet access, there is a firewall server that transparently acts as a proxy server for all traffic into and out of our network. All IP tracking attempts from the Internet will show only the firewall server's IP address. So that means that 10 different people on 10 different computers, some in the office and some at home, could all hit a Web site and it appears to that site that all the traffic came from one host IP (because, in reality, it all did: the firewall proxy server).

One more point is that, even if there is no firewall proxy server, multi-user computers such as Unix servers can host multiple people all running Web browsers at the same time. If 10 people are using one computer, with one IP address, at the same time to hit a Web site, tracking attempts by that Web site may only be able to show 10 hits from the same IP address which could lead to an inaccurate impression that one person hit the site 10 times. In reality, it may have been 10 people hitting the site one time each, or any other combination that adds up to 10 hits.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

In defense of the anon, Travis, it IS a free forum. Whether asked to leave or not has no bearing at all. Anon is not in your living room but is in cyberspace.

Might I offer a suggestion? Quit responding, the anon said it would leave, let it.

And basically for all of you who are not computer literate, there is no way to catch anon and even if we did, it would do no good. Tos notices are a dime a dozen and they can always find another ISP. Why not consider a pass-word protected site?

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

No it is not in "cyberspace". It exists on a server. That server belongs to someone. It is more like being in someone’s living room then you think. It is a common misconception that the internet is an amorphous body without a home. Those bits and bytes land someone and can be governed by the where they land and who sends them.

Now if I asked them to leave it has no bearing. That is not true of the person who owns the equipment and software this runs on or their officers. Even though the forum is free to use does not mean it is free in the sense of being without regulation. Although in the case of Greenspun you might be right. I cannot find a policy about usage anywhere. This is silly of them because those policies protect them from a lot of problems.

TOSs may be a dime a dozen but that doesn’t mean they have no relevance. They give you recourse to eliminate a problem. Don’t dismiss them so easily. EULAs are a dime a dozen too. That doesn’t mean you should pirate software all over the place and then whine when they arrest you for it.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

I have another reason Gwen should use a different forum software besides blocking unwanted people. EDITING your own posts. ACK!

In paragraph one someone should be somewhere.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Travis I do not believe greenspun has any recourse as far as I know.

It is still cyberspace and everyone is suspect in the internet world.

The difference between them being in our living room is quite simple, we could have a trespasser arrested, but not an internet squatter.

The nice thing to do would for the person/persons to leave, but if they/it does not do so, there is no recourse.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Craig, I beg to differ. A year or two ago a couple was convicted of harassing a board at ivillage - I think they had to pay a hefty fine. While I don't believe that their posts were threatening to any individual posters, their sheer number and negative nature were deemed to be threatening. So, there is recourse. Mind you, it would be expensive and time consuming.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
Is this a true case? Care to provide a link? As for negative posts, gee whiz there are alot of them, everywhere. I really would like to see the case law.

To be frank, I dont believe it. But I am willing to be proven wrong.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Craig, the board that was terrorized was the Attachment Parenting board at Parent Soup (part of ivillage). I used to frequent the board when the ruling came down against these folks (oddly enough, it was a couple with two young kids). Unfortunately, I don't have a link, but could get info from the community leaders there if you *really* don't believe me. As that relates to this board, I'm not sure - I'm assuming it's easier to trace posts at ivillage and similar sites as they're password protected (plus provides another layer of TOS agreements into the mix). As for the nature of the posts, well, I believe they were calling breastfeeding women child molesters and other comments to that effect.

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001
I'm going to cut and paste all of Milla's and Paul W.'s posts on this thread so that sometime I can read them slowly and *maybe* understand how this works. I'm going back to my easy mol. biol. work.

BTW, I've waited too long to say this, but I just want to say that I have met James and his wife and they seem to be down-to-earth, fun people. We had dinner at a nice restaraut where they kindly paid for me. James is going to give my daughter's Brownie troop a tour of the plant that he manages. James and his wife were very comfortable with each other and fun to watch together. I hope that someday I have a relationship like theirs *sign*. His wife was, and continues to be, thoughtful, caring and considerate. And for the record, James has treated me that way as well. I know all too well that Internet personas may be drastically differ than in real life, but so far real life is fine. I'm sorry James, if you are reading this, that I ever jokingly called you the "Tide Pool Troll".

-- Anonymous, March 28, 2001

Moderation questions? read the FAQ