When you 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. Instead of changing your IP, it's probably easier to simply hide it. Or you can call your ISP directly and ask for a new address, but that might lead to some tedious questions. You can also disconnect your modem for a period of time, and see if your ISP assigns you a new address when you come back online.

There are even some websites that can do the same. Search the internet and you find all sorts of arcane command-line magic words that will, allegedly, get you a new address. Our ISPs assign them to us (and sometimes revoke and recycle them), our routers use them, and we continue happily along-until we need to change something.Īlthough very few of us are actually in charge of our own IP addresses, there are some ways to force a change. Keep It Secret, Keep It Safeīecause there's a finite number of IP addresses (4,294,967,296, under IPv4) and only so many available by location, mere mortals like you and me generally don't have to worry about our IP addresses.

This is probably more than you will ever need to know about IP addresses, but you can now impress your friends with these handy factoids about Papal networks. Meanwhile, the Vatican has a mere 17,920 addresses. For example, the United States has a reported 1,541,605,760 addresses allocated to it, which is about 36 percent of all the IP addresses available (at least, under IPv4, as opposed to IPv6, but that's a story for another time). Instead, they allocate blocks of numbers to different regions. IANA doesn't directly provide you with an IP address. The allocation of these addresses isn't random either. These are the same people responsible for sorting out domain names and other factors critical to internet communication. These aren't random addresses they're mathematically produced and allocated by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), a division of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Best Malware Removal and Protection Software.

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