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Reference number: CH001043
How does a website / advertisement know where I am?
Question:
How does a website / advertisement know where I am?
Answer:
When visiting some websites you may notice that the page or ad on
that page is marketing directly to you. For example, it may be
advertising singles in your city or state, this type of advertising
is known as geo-targeting and
is done by analyzing the location of your
Hostname,
IP address and/or analyzing the
hops in a
traceroute
of your IP address.
This information gathered often points to the location of your ISP. However, with more
sophisticated systems it may be able to also gather the exact city
you personally live in.
In addition to getting your location using the above methods
geo-tracking can also be done when filling out forms on a website,
for example, after registering with a site it may store a
cookie on your computer and use
that cookie to give you more targeted advertising.
How much information can geo-targeting get on
me?
The rudimentary form of geo-targeting that obtains
its data from your hostname or IP address will not be able to get
anything more than your City, State, Country and sometimes Zip code.
More personal information such as your full home address, phone
number, name, birth date, age, sex, etc. cannot be obtained from
your computer without you filling out some type of form first.
Additional information:
- See document CH001044 for
additional information about how to manually lookup and find an
address associated with a IP address or hostname.
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