How do you change your IP Address?

When you connect to the Internet, your Internet Service Provider (known as ISP) assigns an IP address. Depending on the type of service you subscribed, you may be allocated to use static or dynamic IP address. A static IP address is a permanent (non-changing) IP address assigned to you. Most users on the other hand gets an dynamically assigned IP address from their ISP. The device (a router, gateway or computer) connected to your ISP allows you to connect to the Internet, and also allows you to change its IP address. This article only pertains to changing an IP address of dynamically assigned IP address (via the DHCP).

Change your IP Country with a Virtual Private Network

You may want to change your public IP address for a variety of reasons. If your IP address is banned by certain game servers or your download allowance from a P2P network has expired, obtaining a different IP address from your current ISP will solve your problem (see instruction below). However, if you wish to bypass regional block and wish to obtain an IP address from a different country, changing an IP address from your ISP will not help you. For example, if you want to watch BBC, Netflix, Spotify or Hulu from a region where those services are blocked, you will need a VPN service to obtain an IP address of a country where the service is allowed. With VPN, you'll also surf Internet anonymously with added security.

Here are a few VPN providers we recommend:

• Hide My Ass
• Express VPN (30 Day Money Back Guarantee)
• Vypr VPN (Free Trial)
• Pure VPN (Exclusive 75% off on yearly plan to IPlocation.net visitors.)
• IP Vanish VPN

We receive compensation when a purchase is made from the referred link. Our recommendation is based on our research and positive feedback we received from the users who've used the services.

Ok, I got it so how do I change IP address?

If you renew your IP address from your current ISP, your ISP may or may not assign you a new IP address. Depending on how you're connected to the Internet, you may have to reset different device. If you're connected via a router, you'll have to change IP address of your router. If you're connected directly to the Internet via a layer-2 gateway, you'll have to change your computer's IP address. Most home network is connected via a router, so chances are that you need to change IP address of your router. In this article, I will describe how to change IP address of your router and also show you how to change IP address of your computer. There are a number of ways to change IP address, so I'll describe easiest method first and then describe a bit more complicated methods.

In order to verify that you've changed an IP address of your device, you'll have to visit Find My IP page of our website.

How to change IP address of a router?

A router is a layer 3 networking device that connects multiple computers to the Internet. In home network with dynamically assigned IP address, a router is assigned a public IP address and all the computers connected to the router is assigned a private IP address. When computers connected to the router visits the Internet, the world views your computer with a public IP address of your router. So, if you want the world to see you with a different IP address, you'll have to change IP address of your router. Here are a few ways to change IP address of your router.

• Turn off your router for a minute and turn it back on. The common nature of DHCP is to "remember" the device and assign you the same IP address you had before, so simply turning off your router and turning it back on will not likely change IP address. However, if you try multiple times you may get lucky and will obtain a new IP address from your ISP. If multiple tries doesn't get you a new IP address, try leaving the router turned off overnight and restart in the morning.
• Reconnect your router to your ISP via administrative Interface. Most routers allow you to disconnect from upstream ISP, and reconnect via a point-and-click from the Administrative Console. Each router vendor provides a different UI to achieve this, but once you login to the Administrative Console of the router you should be able to locate the reconnect button. The screenshot below is the method provided by the Asus RT-N66W model.

How to change IP address of a computer?

• Shutdown your computer for a minute and turn it back on. Again, the common nature of DHCP is to assign the device same IP address each time it connects to the network, it's unlikely that you'll receive different address first time your restart your computer. If you restart a few times, you may get lucky and get a new IP address from your router.
• Renew your IP address. You may manully release your IP address and obtain a new IP address with Windows ipconfig utility. Please follow the following steps.
On Windows 7 and below, click Start -> Run, and type cmd as shown below. On Windows 8, type WIN key and X key to bring Power User Menu -> Choose Run.

On the Command Prompt screen, run "ipconfig /release" and "ipconfig /renew" commands as shown below. You'll have to start Elevated Command Prompt (Run as System Administrator) to execute ipconfig command.

C:\> ipconfig

Windows IP Configuration

Ethernet adapter Wireless Network Connection:

        Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . :
        IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.101
        Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
        Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1

C:\> ipconfig /release
Windows IP Configuration

No operation can be performed on Local Area Connection while it has its media
disconnected.

Ethernet adapter Wireless Network Connection:

        Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . :
        IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 0.0.0.0
        Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 0.0.0.0
        Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . :

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

        Media State . . . . . . . . . . . : Media disconnected

C:\> ipconfig /renew

Windows IP Configuration

Ethernet adapter Wireless Network Connection:

        Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . :
        IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.102
        Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
        Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1

Verify that you have a new IP address by either typing ipconfig command, or by visiting Find My IP page. On our example above, the IP address has been changed from 192.168.1.101 to 192.168.1.102. Again, the nature of DHCP is to assign the device same IP address as before so you may have run this step multiple times to change your IP address.
• You may use a proxy server or VPN to conceal your true IP address, and borrow an IP from a 3rd-party Proxy or VPN provider.

Use someone else's network

As with Hide IP Address, you can always use someone else's network and obtain an IP address from that network. Try using free Wi-Fi services from a local coffee shop, hotel, library or any other public offerings. An IP address does not travel with your computer, so using someone else's network may be a viable solution.

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What is a VPN?

A Virtual Private Network (VPN) is a network technology which extends private network (such as LAN) over a public network such as the Internet. A VPN allows a computer (or a network) to be connected securely as if they are physically wired together. Corporations use VPN to allow remote workers to connect securely to their private network. A VPN is also used to interconnect remote offices with a head office as if they are physically connected.

Besides interconnecting private networks, a VPN is also used to hide ip address or change ip addressby connecting to a 3rd-party VPN provider to protect oneself from exposing to public networks.

Advantages

1. The primary reason for implementing VPN technology is to create a secure connection to the other endpoint. Creating a WAN connectivity is very costly, and may not be practical for individual users making client to server connection. The information exchanged between the two VPN endpoints is encrypted, and hence no eavesdropping can occur when information is transmitted over public network.
2. A VPN can also be used to hide your privacy by disguising true IP address of the user's computer. Online gamers may use VPN to hide IP address of their computers, and business owners may use VPN to change IP address to protect their identity from their competitors.

Disadvantages

1. Since all virtual private network traffic is encrypted, there will be 10-15% increase in payload transmitted over VPN. This additional overhead causes (1) computing devices to use more processing power to encrypt the data, (2) send more data over the network, and finally (3) takes longer to transmit data as there will be 10-15% additional data. With advancement in computing and network technologies, the additional processing power required to encrypt/decrypt and additional data transmission have negligible impact on overall usage of the network.
2. Not all VPN appliances interoperate well, so a VPN device from one vendor may not work well from a device from another vendor. A network engineer implementing the VPN technology must verify compability between the two endpoints. Similarly, a client to server connection may cause slowness (or degrade in QoS) if VPN is not properly setup.

VPN Protocols

A virtual private network is created by establishing a virtual tunnel between two endpoints via a virtual tunneling protocol or by data encryption. Some of the most popular VPN protocols include IPsec, SSL/TLS, PPTP and L2TP.

Authentication

A VPN connection whether it's a client to server or network to network, tunnel endpoints must be authenticated before establishing a secure connection. A user initiated VPN connection either use password or two-factor authentication whereas network-to-network tunnels often use digital certificates (private/public key combination).

If you have any questions about VPN technology, please post your question on VPN Forum.

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My IP address is hacked. What can I do?

Many readers of our website are contacting us for help on *allegedly* hacked IP address, and remedies for getting it back. One of the user is telling us his IP address used to be 64.3.x.y in Dallas and now it's 67.72.x.y located in Utah (per ip lookup); and hence his IP address is stolen, and his computer is running very slow and acting abnormal.

For a non-computer person, this may sound like a user's IP address has been hacked but in reality your IP address cannot be hacked. Chances are that you're getting your IP address dynamically from your Service Provider whom may be servicing multiple areas. When you disconnect from your ISP and reconnect to the Internet, you're getting a new IP address from your Internet Service Provider and this IP address may or may not be the same as previously assigned. This does not mean you're sharing this IP address with someone else, as you've just assigned a new IP address and your old IP address may have been assigned to a new person in Utah. As ISPs servicing multiple cities, they may allocate their IP address how ever they desire, and this may cause location of IP address to be incorrectly shown. Getting an IP address that shows remote location (Utah) does not slow down your computer, or cause it to act abnormal.

If your computer is acting slow or behave abnormal, you may have spyware or virus on your computer. Slowness of your computer has nothing to do with your IP address. You may wish to scan your computer for virus, and remove them.

If someone knows my IP address, can they hack my computer?

Depending on how your computer is connected to the Internet and the type of security in place, your computer may vulnerable for hack. In reality, chances of your computer being hacked from your known IP address is very unlikely. The trouble of hacker trying to gain access to your computer doesn't justify hacking into your computer unless you have billions of dollars in your bank account accessible from your personal computer. The most easiest way for hackers to gain access to your computer is through virus, not by attacking an IP address.

I have a static IP address. Can my computer (or server) hacked?

Having a static IP address doesn't increase the chance of your server being hacked, but vulnerable software and configuration may allow hackers to randomly attack your computer. Hackers learn known vulnerability on certain types of software, and using known vulnerability hackers randomly attack machines. Servers directly connected to the Internet are more exposed than the personal computers sitting behind the router with firewall. Unless you're a network professional managing servers, chances of your personal computer hacked is very small. Again, the easiest way to hack into your computer is by through a rootkit or virus.

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What is IP Spoofing?

IP Spoofing is a technique used to gain unauthorized access to machines, whereby an attacker illicitly impersonate another machine by manipulating IP packets. IP Spoofing involves modifying the packet header with a forged (spoofed) source IP address, a checksum, and the order value. Internet is a packet switched network, which causes the packets leaving one machine may be arriving at the destination machine in different order. The receiving machine resembles the message based on the order value embedded in the IP header. IP spoofing involves solving the algorithm that is used to select the order sent values, and to modify them correctly.

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