AuthorsI. Livadariu, T. Dreibholz, A. S. Al-Selwi, H. Bryhni, O. Lysne, S. Bjørnstad and A. Elmokashfi
TitleOn the Accuracy of Country-Level IP Geolocation
AfilliationCommunication Systems
Project(s)GAIA, NorNet, The Center for Resilient Networks and Applications, Simula Metropolitan Center for Digital Engineering
StatusPublished
Publication TypeProceedings, refereed
Year of Publication2020
Conference NameApplied Networking Research Workshop (ANRW)
Date Published07/2020
PublisherACM
Place PublishedMadrid/Spain
ISBN Number978-1-4503-8039-3
KeywordsGeolocation Approaches, Geolocation Databases, IP Geolocation
Abstract

The proliferation of online services comprised of globally spread microservices has security and performance implications. Understanding the underlying physical paths connecting end points has become important. This paper investigates the accuracy of commonly used IP geolocation approaches in geolocating end-to-end IP paths. To this end, we perform a controlled measurement study to collect IP level paths. We find that existing databases tend to geolocate IPs that belong to networks with global presence and those move between networks erroneously. A small percentage of IP geolocation disagreement between databases results in a significant disagreement when geolocating end-to-end paths. Geolocating one week of RIPE traceroute data validates our observations.

DOI10.1145/3404868.3406664
Citation KeyANRW2020