IP address
 

My friend and I are arging if you could locate a computer with an IP address. I say it's possible on a wireless network and tri-anglulation (sp?) and James bond stuff, like they can with a cell phone.

Is it possible?

as far as locating a computer with an IP address, it is indeed possible to a degree. It is the same way a packet is able to be routed to your computer. It has to make certain hops to get there, and it goes through certain routers.

it is actually really easy.. programs like traceroute will easily track what routers a packet will go through to get from point A to point B, but you just need to know some of the major routers and you can generally pin it down to a region of the world. try xtraceroute and it will give you a nice graphical map of the world and show you the lines that designate the --hehe family guy-- path taken by the packet.

i hunt down computers at work all the time, i take the IP run trace it to a switch, and then look up where that port goes.

as for wireless, its a bit harder but it can be done, all though it is beyond what i have at my disposal.

If you want to pin it down to say, a yard, it could probably only be done with wireless connections. The trick would be sending a specific pattern of data (pings) to the computer, expecting a certain return pattern. That pattern of emissions that go through the wireless router should be triangulatable. But the signal won't reach miles, so you'd need a general idea of the area in which to look for and/or highly sensitive equipment.

For wired systems this is is obviously unfeasible. (though you could in theory trace the machine through the traffic in the wire, you'd need to locate the wire first (electromagnetic influence isn't that great...) and if you'd had the wire you would probably have a good idea of the machine as well...)

But I'm no electro-expert, I could be way off....

I'm a Network Engineer.

Several commercial wireless products will let you triangulate a wireusers position to withing about 20 feet. Three different WAP's need to see the signal.

On the wired side, it pretty easy for anyone to track down a user to his ISP. The ISP shouldbe able to locate the user to a floor, if it's a campus environment, or to withing a small 10 or 20 block radius using the DEMARC/aggregation point the users DSL/cable comes in on.

IPv6 can embed the users MAC address in the IP address. (The adress is 128 bits long. The lower 64 bits can be something called a EUI-64 address, which is the users 48-bit MAC address with 'FFFE' inserted in to the middle.)

All of this is without resorting to any type of records, just putting the technology to use.

Thanks guys that was a real help