Geolocating requests with Google Load Balancer for free (opens in new tab)

(blog.doit-intl.com)

199 pointsvadimska8y ago68 comments

68 comments

58 comments · 30 top-level

SteveCoast8y ago· 5 in thread

I've been working on and off on a system to build this data for free - https://www.open-geo-ip.com/

It uses your browser location to build the data, bootstrapped with Mechanical Turk workers around the world. It has one feedback loop, where if you use the JS library it will give you the users location if they deny browser location (if we have the data...) and if they do share location, then we update the database (but throw away the last part of their IP address).

There are two or three other loops where we could build more data (which you can get here https://www.open-geo-ip.com/data/download ).

I'm probably going to do a small kickstarter to pay for some cleanup and expansion work or just kill it if that fails to get funded. Any ideas appreciated on things to do with it.

cpeterso8y ago

Cool project! I've been thinking about how one could build a crowdsourced geoIP database. Bootstrapping with Mechanical Turk is an interesting approach, especially if you can request workers in different cities and countries. One idea I had was a browser extension that volunteers could install to automatically submit their current location and IP address on browser startup.

It would be helpful if the home page demonstrated the passive geolocation results. The page asked for my browser location but didn't show the result.

btw the map zooming is very slow in my mobile browser for some reason.

reaperducer8y ago

> it will give you the users location if they deny browser location

Seriously? Did you help build BonziBuddy, too?

SteveCoast8y ago

Ha.

Well right now a) we most likely have no idea where an ip address is and b) even if we do, it's nearest-city accuracy.... which is exactly what everyone else does.

Denying browser location doesn't stop the app or website from using your ip address against some third party service to figure out where you are.

2 more replies

forgot-my-pw8y ago

Whelp, all those markers almost crashed my browser.

SteveCoast8y ago

Yeah it worked great when we had 100 data points. Another thing to fix :-)

brightball8y ago· 5 in thread

One thing I will say for Maxmind is that their API was exceptionally good at picking up anonymous proxies like Tor.

I dealt with a ton of fraud a couple of jobs ago and being able to eliminate credit card transactions for people on Tor was huge in cutting down on charge backs from fake card use. The minFraud API was really beneficial as well.

Don't sell the offering short.

michaelmior8y ago

I don't doubt that there are a lot of baddies using Tor (and I wouldn't be surprised if that was the majority of Tor users in some cases). It's a shame though that cutting off Tor access is the solution. A very reasonable one from a business standpoint, but unfortunate.

dmoy8y ago

Doesn't have to be a majority of Tor users, if the tiny minority of actors are flooding tons of stolen cc transactions. A normal person may make an online purchase a day or so, while someone trying to get as much value as possible out of a bunch of stolen cc may just spam a lot of transactions.

For the server seeing the incoming cc purchase requests, it's still majority fraud...

dylz8y ago

Tor is a special case here: you can use any Tor DNSBL and it will pick up 100% of the nodes, effectively.

All Tor IPs specifically and publicly advertise the fact that they are an open proxy.