Pedro Martínez: Would that necessarily prove it? I was told I get a different one each time I log onto the internet because I use AOL. I don't know what an IP address is. Are they specific to a single phone line? How large of an area would one overlap? Could a neighbor of mine have the same one? In the same house? What about people that play in different locations? I've played from Reno, Nevada before. What about people that use a cable modem or DSL to access the internet? Would the cable system have the same IP for the whole city?

Pedro Martínez: Only Fencer can see the IP address used to access the site - which like Walter said is not always a good thing to look at since sometimes people on the same "system" will share "master" IP addresses, plus it is pretty simple to fake, or go through some sort of proxy server to hide the IP address.

BIG BAD WOLF: Thanks, I was not looking for a "proof", just a possibility. I'll have to ask Fencer then.

Pedro Martínez: every time i log on i get a different IP address...I think it is the first 3 numbers that change but im not sure on that....

Pedro Martínez: It could be a family member. Two computers connected to the internet would most likely connect through a router. Once the connection goes out on the internet, they would both have the same IP address. What would be a better tracking would be their MAC address. This is used for NAT so that data comming back can find the appropriate computer. Remember, to the internet, everycomputer behind a router appears to have the router's IP address.

Did I get this right?

Summertop: Absolutely. From time to time my brother and I play with the same IP because we see each other and are behind the same router. You can't conclude anything from that fact!

Summertop: "Remember, to the internet, everycomputer behind a router appears to have the router's IP address.

Did I get this right?"

No. That's not even true for NAT (as you can have two computers sharing one IP address and two computers sharing another with NAT - still NAT, but they're not all the same IP).

bitwisexor: Well, I'm not sure how the NAT (network Address Translation) works, But I do know that two computers behind a router will appear to the internet as having the same IP address. That is, they will both appear to have to IP address of the router. For example: If you have a Linksys wireless router, the computers behind it will have private IP address (192.68.x.x). If you connect to a server on the internet, the server will see them as the public IP assigned to the router (usually assigned by your ISP).

Summertop: I'm sure you know that, it doesn't make it any more correct though ;) A NAT router that has just one IP address will make all computers behind it appear to have one IP address, yes. But it doesn't have too.

I've got a router sitting right here that doesn't, actually. I've got all of 2001:1b40:d::/48, router has 2001:1b40:d::1, this system has 2001:1b40:d:3:2c0:9fff:fe3c:131d and other systems have... umm.. other ones.

/me hopes IPv6 is adequate protection from script kiddies