IP Address Locations

Dep209

Hi, I'm not an IT professional, clearly. I'm a police officer looking for tips for a fraud investigation I'm conducting.  The suspect sent the victim emails, only minutes apart, and the IP address locations for these emails are hundreds of miles apart.  Can someone shed light as to how this would happen? Is it IP spoofing? Is that a thing?  Thanks in advance.

JDMurray

Someone sending an email typically has no control over the IP address the email originates from. Instead, the source IP address in the email header is determined by the email service used. You can trace an email back to the email server's IP address, but typically not to the actual IP address of the computer used by the person sending the email.

Also, geo-location via IP address is very inaccurate. The WHOIS database indicates the owner (registrant) of the IP address and not the geo-location of the computer that is actually using the IP address. For example, the IP address you posted from points to Optimum Online of Hicksville, NY, which is the registered owner of the IP address, but you as the actual user of that IP address may not be anywhere near that geo-location. Also, the use of an anonymizing VPN service can make your Internet presence appear to originate from any one of hundreds of locations worldwide.

Dep209

Thank you for the detailed response. This was very helpful.  

JDMurray

No problem!