audience to avoid stepping on anyone else’s toes. Since other companies likely own the rights to that same show elsewhere, Netflix is required to limit it to its U.S. For example, Netflix may have purchased the rights to offer a TV show on its service only in the United States. It’s not so much that they want to do it, but it’s usually required by copyright laws and the terms of their licensing agreements. Geo-blocking is how a website prevents you from watching, reading, or downloading content based on your location. Websites like Netflix, YouTube, Twitch, and others use something called geo-blocking to limit the places where their content can be accessed. Still, it’s not a bad idea to hide that information when visiting websites where you don’t feel entirely comfortable giving up too much personal information. They won’t necessarily use this information in the wrong ways, but they may track the way you interact with a website, or a service they use might need your real IP address to work properly.Īgain, this doesn’t mean they’ll sell the information and profit from you. Many websites use your IP address to track you and learn more about you. The goal is to hide any IP addresses that are personally associated with you and offer up something far less specific instead.ġ. To be clear, IP addresses are necessary to make the internet work, so your traffic needs to come from an IP address somewhere, but that doesn’t mean websites and services have to see your real one. So, there are more than enough reasons why you might want to hide your IP address. They can use it for relatively harmless things like sending you targeted ads, or for far more dangerous activities like cyberattacks. Why Would I Want to Hide My Real IP Address?Įven though the numbers on your IP address might not look like much, professional marketers and hackers know how to take advantage of this information. More importantly, since your IP address often remains the same for days, or even weeks at a time, it can be used to follow your activity across different websites and services.

It’s basically an identifier that lets the digital world know where you are.

Your Internet Protocol or IP address is a unique address that identifies where you’re connecting from, sometimes right down to the individual device that you’re using. To begin with, you might not be sure of what an IP address is, so we’ll give you a quick explanation. This is a one-time purchase for the latest full versions of Office apps for Mac (and Windows), and they’ll work forever.Find Out More What’s an IP Address? Sick of Subscriptions? This Limited-Time Microsoft Office Deal Gets You Lifetime Access for Just $50

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