pixelbomb

The days of anonymous web browsing just might be over. WorldNet Daily is reporting that a new patent has just been granted to the National Security Agency (NSA) describing a method for geolocating logical network addresses.

Patent 6,947,978, granted this week, describes a process based on latency, or time lag between computers exchanging data, of “numerous” known locations on the Internet to build a “network latency topology map” for all users. Identifying the physical location of an individual user, reports CNET News.com, could then be accomplished by measuring how long it takes to connect to an unknown computer from numerous known machines, and using the latency response to display location on a map.

Yes, yes … ping, traceroute, a bundle of root IP information, and a few other toys. Nothing terribly new, but add in latency calculations and combine it together as a single system, and it could be deadly accurate. Now go do something useful with it and hunt down those damn spammers.

[thanks Paul]

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 28th, 2005 at 12:11 am and is tagged with tech, web. You can discuss this entry, share pictures, and more in the pixelbomb forums. Responses are currently closed, but you can click here to generate a trackback url for your own site.