66 Wild West 2.0
There is no central authority that monitors or controls connec-
tions; as a matter of technology, connecting to the Internet is en-
tirely a private affair. A few governments—in places like China and
North Korea—have attempted to outlaw or monitor private con-
nections, with rather limited success. The practical result is that
home users can simply call up a local Internet Service Provider
(“ISP”)—often their cable TV provider or a phone company—and
connect to the Internet. Nobody other than the ISP will know the
identity of the new subscriber. The government won’t know the
identity of any users unless it invokes its law enforcement power to
subpoena the ISP; websites won’t know unless the subscriber re-
veals her own identity; and other users won’t know unless they can
convince the user to reveal herself or hire lawyers and obtain a civil
subpoena.
Once connected, the new user can communicate with any of the
millions of computers on the Internet. This is possible because of a
communication system known as “IP,” or “Internet Protocol.” All data
that are transferred over the Internet use Internet Protocol, and it is
“Internet Protocol” that gave the Internet its name.
A very short explanation of IP will show why Internet anonymity
is so powerful. Internet Protocol is nothing more than a communi-
cations language shared among all computers connected to the In-
ternet (see Figure 5-1). Data of any kind (e-mails, pictures, songs,
web pages, or videos) can be sent over the Internet by breaking it into
small “packets.” These packets contain the data that are to be sent, as
well as some addressing information known as the “header.” Once
sent, a packet is automatically forwarded from one computer to an-
other until it reaches its destination. There is no predictable route
that any particular packet will follow; the Internet is intentionally de-
signed so that packets are automatically passed toward their desti-
nation along whatever route seems fastest at the time. For example,
one packet sent from a home user in New York to a website in San
Francisco might be passed along a chain of computers from New
York to Chicago to San Francisco. The next packet between the same
computers might pass through Seattle or Houston instead if the
Chicago route is too crowded or slow.
Communication across a network of this size is possible because
packets are routed on the basis of the “IP address” of the sender and
recipient (see Figure 5-2). Each computer or group of computers
(such as at an office or university) is associated with an IP address.
An IP address is nothing more than a series of numbers—for exam-
ple, 64.233.169.147—that uniquely identifies one particular com-
puter or group of computers. The IP address of the sender and the
recipient are contained in the packet’s “header” section, and comput-
ers that receive the packet automatically pass it toward the IP address
of its destination.
Figure 5-1. Internet Routing. Several possible paths that a computer in New York
might use to communicate with a website in San Francisco. In the process of view-
ing a single Web page, one or all of these paths might be used. Illustration: David
Thompson.
67Anonymous Cowards
Other than the IP address of sender and recipient, there is no
user identification built into IP. Each data packet travelling across
the Internet is identified only by the IP address of the sender and the
recipient. But these are just numbers; nothing in IP discloses a user’s
name, location, e-mail address, physical address, or any other identi-
fying information. The IP system is designed only to move data pack-
68 Wild West 2.0
Figure 5-2. Internet Protocol Illustrated. When you want to view a website, your
computer sends a short message to the website over the Internet. The message con-
tains very little information: usually just some information about the web page
you would like to view, some technical routing information, and your IP address.
You are identified only by IP address unless you have disclosed information
about yourself. The website then sends the digital files that make up the website
back to you, using your IP address to route the information back to you. Your
computer assembles these files to display a graphical website. Illustration: David
Thompson.
R
E
Q
U
E
S
T
IP Packet
Dear webserver at
wildwest2.com:
Please send the webpage
at http://wildwest2.com/
Please send the data to IP
address 74.125.67.100
R
E
S
P
O
N
S
E
IP Packet
Dear computer at
74.125.67.100
Here is part 2 of 56 of
the webpage at
http://wildwest2.com
010100010101100101 . . .
Many Internet routers
all over the world
A website
Your Computer
Many (possibly different)
Internet routers all over
the world
A website
Your Computer
IP Packet
Dear computer at
74.125.67.100
Here is part 1 of 56 of
the webpage at
http://wildwest2.com
111010010101010101 . . .
69Anonymous Cowards
ets from point to point on the Internet and does not even consider
user authentication.
When you view a web page, your computer sends a request for
that web page to the webserver that “hosts” the website you are view-
ing. A webserver or webhost is just a computer that responds to re-
quests for website files. A popular website like Google.com may use
thousands of webservers, while a smaller site like WildWest2.com is
likely to share a webserver with other websites. After getting your re-
quest, the webserver returns the files that make up the website or
sends back an error message if the page cannot be found.
When your computer sends such a request for a web page, it uses
Internet Protocol to transmit the message across the Internet.
3
The
packet contains only minimal information—no more than the web
page you are requesting, the IP address where your computer can be
reached, and some technical routing information. This is true even if
you are uploading a file, making a forum post, or using a Web-based
e-mail service like Gmail; unless you have disclosed some identifying
information (or your computer has been configured or hacked to do
so automatically), you are effectively anonymous online.
Internet Protocol Allows and
Encourages Anonymity
Often, the only fingerprint Web users leave behind is their IP ad-
dress. But an IP address does not necessarily correspond to a partic-
ular human user. The IP address does not contain any information
about the individual user or computer that sent a message; it is, as we
noted, just a number. There are Web-based databases that allow an
IP address to be linked to a particular ISP (so that you can tell
whether your attacker gets his Internet service from Verizon or
Comcast), but no publicly accessible database connects individual
users to individual IP addresses.
Even if it were possible to know that a particular person was us-
ing a particular IP address one day, that does not mean that the same
70 Wild West 2.0
person was using that address some other day. Dial-up Internet con-
nections often assign a different IP address to a user each time the
person connects. Cable modem and DSL operators often periodi-
cally reassign IP addresses for the security of their users, so one
user’s IP address today may be another’s tomorrow. One IP address
may not even uniquely identify one computer: Many corporate
LANs have only one externally visible IP address and use “Network
Address Translation” (“NAT”) technology to mediate requests be-
tween many internal computers and the outside Internet. Any user in
such a corporate system will appear to have the same address as any
other user. Many home cable modem routers do the same; if there
are multiple computers inside a house (or apartment, or college dorm
room), they may appear to share one IP address. The same goes
again for coffee shops and other open wireless connections; all of the
users at the shop might share one IP address for most purposes.
Only an ISP will be able to even try to determine who was using
an IP address at a given time. Most reputable ISPs keep logs for a pe-
riod of time (often ninety days to one year) that correlate IP address
assignments with real subscriber data. But, most major ISPs will not
give out subscriber information without legal process. And under-
standably so: ISPs don’t want to risk a lawsuit for violating the pri-
vacy expectations of their subscribers.
If these problems trying to identify users based on IP address
weren’t enough, many users take steps to intentionally break the link
between their identity and their IP address. There are some legiti-
mate reasons to increase anonymity: an activist’s fear of an oppressive
government or a whistleblower’s fear of corporate retaliation. But
these same methods are also abused by malicious attackers, hackers,
child pornographers, and gossipers.
Some forms of anonymity are simple. Using a neighbor’s unse-
cured wireless network is often sufficient to hide one’s identity. Of
course, that method requires a neighbor with an unsecured wireless
network within range. The effectiveness of that method is also lim-
ited: The source of a message can still be located to within the short
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