4 ms·
Ask HN: Google suddenly locates me in a wrong country, what to do?
Hey all,
I'm suddenly being detected as located in a Eastern European country (I'm in Canada). This is more than just a minor annoyance:
-Google searches yield results in a foreign language, products are being shown in a foreign currency;
-I'm suddenly unable to order groceries online, as the stores use googleapis to locate me and their sites just lock-up trying to show me the nearest store; blocking googleapis results in all sorts of weird errors or messages as "sorry, we don't deliver to your location"
What could've possibly generated this? on the bottom of https://google.com, the erroneous location is justified by "based on your IP" - but my IP belongs to a major North-American ISP, with whom I've been for 20 years. Weirder yet, it's a fixed IP (second I had in the past two decades, the first one was something like 1.2.3.4, changed a few years ago to 1.2.3.5 - so rebooting the router/modem is useless, as it will get the same IP).
I reported the error twice last week, using Google's very simplified form - but nothing changed.
I'm stumped. Any suggestions? Right now I'm even considering switching ISPs (which I really don't want to, as I'm very happy with my current one), although, from time to time, on the bottom of google.com's page, the location is justified as "based on your previous activity" - what the devil is this? if I look up something in Mongolia, Google decides that I'm suddenly located there?!
I really don't understand what could've lead to this -- and, especially, how to get out of this situation.
Also: I don't browse/search logged into my Google account; as a last resort I logged into Google, manually set my location to where I actually am and ran a search: nothing changed, still being detected in Eastern Europe "based on my IP".
The only thing I can do is force redetection with "Update location", but that: a) is only valid for the current device (I have several in my household) and b) lasts only a limited time.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- supermatou 2y agoForgot to mention: asking Google "what's my IP" shows my correct IP, but the bottom of the page places it in Eastern Europe. Every other service linked on the results page locates me correctly i.e. in Canada. Also: in my Google account, "Where you're signed in" shows my Air, my iPhone, my Pixel and my Chromebook in the correct location (Canada, $MyCity).
- bell-cot 2y agoNot an expert...but is there any chance your traffic has recently seen a major change, from Google's PoV? Especially, might one of your devices have become a TOR entry/exit node, part of a VPN, or something similar?
- supermatou 2y ago> any chance your traffic has recently seen a major change, > from Google's PoV? Especially, might one of your devices have > become a TOR entry/exit node, part of a VPN, or something similar? Absolutely not. I'm not even using a VPN or any other method of tunneling into some remote server. I found on the internet a few similar complaints, like someone in the Netherlands who was suddenly detected as being in Israel; he couldn't find any remedy, but mentioned that "the situation returned to normal in a month or so". But, as I already said, for me it's become more than a curiosity and a minor annoyance, as it's now interfering with my ability to shop online.
- gregjor 2y agoThat happened to me and I had to move to Thailand to resolve the problem. Google support completely useless, of course.
- bauruine 2y agoCall your ISP it looks like some of their IPs have a wrong geolocation. Maybe they recently aquired new IPv4 addresses that where previously located in eastern Europe.
- supermatou 2y agoAgain, it's a major ISP, and I've been with them for the past 20 years. They've been using the same allocated IPs since the early Nineties - and EVERY detection services correctly assigns those IPs to my ISP, in my region.
- bauruine 2y agoSorry I should have read it completely and not just skim through it. I would still complain with the ISP.
- supermatou 2y agoYou're right, a new IP from their pool should take care of this issue. Thing is, I'd like to know what could've possibly made Google think my current IP is in EE? what did I do to make Google Search - and ONLY Google Search think that?
- supermatou 2y agoBut wait: it gets even funnier(?): https://www.where-am-i.co/ https://www.where-am-i.co/ which uses Google maps/location services, places me in my correct location. Asking Google Search "what is my current location", places me in Eastern Europe. Go figure.