Is my computer's IP Address traceable to my location?

they do it on the crime shows on tv. lol

Yes you can track an ip to it’s general physical location. It’s frighteningly simple. http://whatismyipaddress.com/
will allow you to plug in an ip and will give you accurate results. Couple that with some basic personal information and they can narrow it down using phone directories, people searches, etc.

If you want it kept private you need to use an anonymous proxy/cloaking program like Anonymizer.

They will give a false IP but they also tend to slow down your computer quite a bit.

Not down to the street address.

If you use Firefox check this out. http://html5demos.com/geo It gets within one block of my house using WiFi triangulation.

With just the IP you can only really get it down to what city you are in.

Mine certainly is, as I have a assigned static IP to facilitate certain things that allow only one IP to do them on my server.

Of course if the authorities have some reason to suspect you of doing something illegal and get a warrant they can find out exactly where you are from your ISP. Or if they simply continue to abuse the National Security letter system as the FBI has been doing.

@Snarp I was shocked, SHOCKED, to find out that the FBI was abusing its national security powers. :-(

look into a remote IP service.

Best way to avoid being tracked by your IP is not to plug your computer into the Ethernet.
If you need to use the Internet, go to the library.

Your IP is traceable, but to varying degrees of accuracy. I check every now and then. My laptop was once traced to a town in outback Australia, when I live in the city. I just used @Merriment‘s link, and it put me on the wrong side of the city. But even if your IP cannot be traced, the MAC address of your network card can be, and that is something that you cannot hide to my knowledge.

It isn’t a big deal though, because it is unlikely (unless you have made enemies of geeks in the past) that you will be targeted in an attack. Hackers usually focus their efforts on corporations, and the little guys don’t usually get stung if you use your internet responsibly. The biggest safety feature of the internet is that there is safety in numbers. The chances that you will be targeted out of the hundreds of millions of internet users is slim.

Use Firefox if it bothers you. @Merriment‘s link gets snagged by a secondary toolbar that drops down in Firefox asking me whether I want to Share Location or Don’t Share. After clicking chare, it got within about 5 city blocks of me.

You can use a VPN service like: https://www.ipredator.se/?lang=en to make it harder to see your real IP address.

Yeah, computer’s IP Address traceable to location

good one shinyy….