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Why does facebook know my location based on my login using firefox?

  • 2 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 9 views
  • Last reply by khum
  • Solved

khum
khum

I don't normally log into my FB account, but I recently did using Firefox. I got a notification stating that I'd logged in using firefox and it also gave my location. How did this happen? Is it a setting on Firefox (which I can't find) or is my location revealed via my ISP's servers and actually has nothing to do with Firefox? That's my best guess, but I'm not really sure.

I don't normally log into my FB account, but I recently did using Firefox. I got a notification stating that I'd logged in using firefox and it also gave my location. How did this happen? Is it a setting on Firefox (which I can't find) or is my location revealed via my ISP's servers and actually has nothing to do with Firefox? That's my best guess, but I'm not really sure.

Chosen solution

hi khum, yes - websites can guess your approximate location based on your ip address that is transmitted with every request (which is necessary to route the traffic to the right place in the network): http://www.yougetsignal.com/tools/network-location/ unfortunately there isn't much that could be done against this, except trying to use a vpn, a proxy service or something like the tor browser to hide your "real" ip address during browsing.

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philipp
philipp
  • Moderator

Chosen Solution

hi khum, yes - websites can guess your approximate location based on your ip address that is transmitted with every request (which is necessary to route the traffic to the right place in the network): http://www.yougetsignal.com/tools/network-location/ unfortunately there isn't much that could be done against this, except trying to use a vpn, a proxy service or something like the tor browser to hide your "real" ip address during browsing.

khum
khum Question owner

Thanks Philipp, much appreciated. I've been sitting on getting a VPN for a while. Think it's time to move.

Just a follow-on question: is there any way to hide the browser you are using?

Modified by khum