Static versus random IP address
 

Hello all,

My ISP provides me with a dynamic IP address so every time I log in it changes, which is GOOD, but... I want to subscribe to a government listing service that demands a static IP address as a requirement for subscription. I don't want to go to a static IP for anything other than this subscription. Any ideas?

Thanks.

Depending on your ISP.. they may provide you with a static IP for a bit extra. That's all I can think of offhand.

Yes, it all depends on your isp. Dialup, cable, DSL will usually have a different ip address for you from time to time. You usually can also pay extra for a static ip. Or, you could go through a proxy server but that prolly isn't very secure and a govt. site prolly will not be too pleased with that either.

if it doesn't have to be a ip address, look into getting a free dns redictector which will point to your ip whenever you update it


www.no-ip.com is an example

Any reason besides cost you don't want to go with a static IP?

if your looking into not getting caught using KaZaA - then i wouldnt switch over to a static IP - the gov't uses static IP to easily track your movements - My only suggestion is not to sign up with that gov't thing and find something else that is equally as pleasing to your needs - unless you really need to then i would suggest what these other ppl have
-SImo

Could you just use a proxy? Lotsa freebies around.

If it's just a web page, use a anonymous proxy. You can get a list from http://publicproxyservers.com.

If its another service that requires ports or something, you could always get an ssh account with a cheap unix host and tunnel from your pc to your host, and then provide the govt service with the host's ip.

Thanks for the ideas, it really is an issue of cost. I like the randomness of the rotating IP address, I am not going to change that. I just wanted to "hook" into a static IP for this stupid ass county government subscription service that saves me a trip to the courthouse every other day.

static IPs are more expensive though...

The most long-standing solution for providing a fixed name lookup for machines on dynamic IP addresses is:

Dyndns.org

Essentially, when you power up your machine and get a new IP, you run a program that informs dyndns.org that a lookup like:
'bozos.dyndns.org' should be mapped to IP address xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx. After that, your IP address can be referenced by the rest of the world as 'bozos.dyndns.org'