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Yeah Geo-IP is "fake" when I look at this deeper, idk why people use this as source of truth also important point when you using Starlink and got totally diffe

Yeah Geo-IP is "fake" when I look at this deeper, idk why people use this as source of truth also important point when you using Starlink and got totally different "relay" station sometimes can be thousand miles away, I think we need to "upgrade" our internet infrastructure for interplanetary system

basilikum 1y ago
It's the best there is and good enough for most business purposes. Regulations may require you not to do business with people in certain countries so you have to do a good faith effort not to provide your services to those people. GeoIP, despite just being an indicator or correlation rather than objective truth, just happens to be that good faith effort.
- alwa 1y ago
  …and for that matter, the more people game GeoIP like this, the less it’s “good enough.” The regulatory imperative isn’t going anywhere, even if we degrade our good-enough, handshake-based, AS-operator-trusting system. If history is any guide, any replacement technology might look a lot more intrusive and a lot more onerous: the first thought that comes to mind is some kind of DRM-style, device-based, attested location surveillance (tied to a government ID? Why not?!) as “proof of location,” and I’m sure the powers that be could come up with “better”…
  - palata 1y ago
    > any replacement technology might look a lot more intrusive Unfortunately, I don't think that not gaming GeoIP will change that. It's going there already.
__m 1y ago
Yes we need more tools to track people
grishka 1y ago
As someone who constantly runs into problems visiting websites because of my IP geolocation, I agree that the system needs to be updated to make it impossible to use IP addresses for anything except packet routing. I have a long thread of screenshots of this crap, and that's just select examples: https://mastodon.social/@grishka/111934602844613193 https://mastodon.social/@grishka/111934602844613193
- vel0city 1y ago
  I live in Texas, but for a while my ISP issued me IP addresses that had some geolocation information suggesting I was in Québec. Hey, at least its still North America. Tons of websites and apps would use that IP location to default payment to Canadian dollars, default language as French, incorrect timezone, metric units instead of imperial. It was like that for a couple of years. Quite annoying.
  - grishka 1y ago
    > metric units instead of imperial Don't see a downside here! :D
    - vel0city 1y ago
      I was thinking the same as I typed up that part! Still strange when they somehow manage to get my location for a weather report right but default to Celsius for temperature.

basilikum 1y ago

It's the best there is and good enough for most business purposes. Regulations may require you not to do business with people in certain countries so you have to do a good faith effort not to provide your services to those people. GeoIP, despite just being an indicator or correlation rather than objective truth, just happens to be that good faith effort.

alwa 1y ago
…and for that matter, the more people game GeoIP like this, the less it’s “good enough.” The regulatory imperative isn’t going anywhere, even if we degrade our good-enough, handshake-based, AS-operator-trusting system. If history is any guide, any replacement technology might look a lot more intrusive and a lot more onerous: the first thought that comes to mind is some kind of DRM-style, device-based, attested location surveillance (tied to a government ID? Why not?!) as “proof of location,” and I’m sure the powers that be could come up with “better”…
- palata 1y ago
  > any replacement technology might look a lot more intrusive Unfortunately, I don't think that not gaming GeoIP will change that. It's going there already.

__m 1y ago

Yes we need more tools to track people

grishka 1y ago

As someone who constantly runs into problems visiting websites because of my IP geolocation, I agree that the system needs to be updated to make it impossible to use IP addresses for anything except packet routing. I have a long thread of screenshots of this crap, and that's just select examples: https://mastodon.social/@grishka/111934602844613193 https://mastodon.social/@grishka/111934602844613193

vel0city 1y ago
I live in Texas, but for a while my ISP issued me IP addresses that had some geolocation information suggesting I was in Québec. Hey, at least its still North America. Tons of websites and apps would use that IP location to default payment to Canadian dollars, default language as French, incorrect timezone, metric units instead of imperial. It was like that for a couple of years. Quite annoying.
- grishka 1y ago
  > metric units instead of imperial Don't see a downside here! :D
  - vel0city 1y ago
    I was thinking the same as I typed up that part! Still strange when they somehow manage to get my location for a weather report right but default to Celsius for temperature.