Why is it scary if someone leaks your IP address? (i.e., How does doxxing actually work?)

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I am *really* not a computer guy, and this question has kinda been on my mind since I found out about doxxing/IP grabbers ages ago. I didn’t really care too much, since I am not a fan of putting people in danger over twitter like a dickhead, but can someone tell me generally why it’s a serious issue if someone leaks your IP?

Since this sounds as if I’m trying to doxx someone: I’m posting after searching my own IP & I found that most websites pinpointed my address to a different country entirely?? (Still a country next to mines, but definitely more than far away enough for me to care if mines were leaked). Famous people who get doxxed online always move away for safety, so I’m really confused why that is when the website I used to check my own IP address on a bunch of places online at once usually all ended up being a whole country off.

Even though I shouldn’t need to state this outright; **don’t give a step-by-step guide on how to doxx people**. I don’t want to know that. I just want to know why IP grabbing is such a big deal and how doxxing is possible vaguely in a way that forces people to move cities.

In: Technology

40 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

For most people I assume it isn’t really an issue as they more than likely just have a random IP address lease from their ISP and it changes from time to time, so the information would only be relevant for a period of time.

However if you have a static address it is slightly more of an issue. Particularly if your ISP shows your location more accurately because of its static nature. For example I have a static IP address that I use to host servers and stuff. Before actually getting a static IP my ISP basically just said this address is in “my state”. But now I actually have a static address they have narrowed it down to the nearest city. And because of the static nature of my address, should someone get their hands on it, it would be easy for them to constantly check for vulnerabilities in the things I host.

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