Meet Your Online Identity: Internet Protocol (IP)

We know where you’ve been. But, we don’t have to. Protect yourself online at all times.

Image by Adi Goldstein from Unsplash

IP is short for internet protocol, this is how we know that you shop online and watch all kinds of videos on YouTube. So how do we know what you do online exactly? Let's start with what helps us figure out what you do then we’ll talk about how we figure this out how’s that?

What is an IP address?

Every device needs an IP address that’s how devices communicate online. An IP is an identifying number that your phone and computer have. Within a network, devices are attributed an IP address and that’s one way you can tell them apart. Another way would be through a Mac address because just like IP addresses devices have individual mac addresses too.

But, I’ve just said that devices are attributed an IP address within a network even though these devices supposedly have an IP address already, so how does that work?

Different Types Of IP Addresses

While all IP addresses are made up of numbers and letters (IPv4 and IPv6) not all IP addresses are used for the same purpose which is why now we’ll be looking at these differences. With the help of Wikipedia, I hope you…