Regional Weirdness With Virgin Media Broadband

[mindcandy]

Hello folks, I'm looking for a little help please,

All of a sudden all of the websites I visit which have regional variances seem to think I'm in Ireland. I've already tried a couple of other forums and Virgin themselves but no-one has a solution/suggestion at this time as to what is wrong.

I'm in Norwich and am used to seeing google.co.uk instead of google.ie, ebay's the same (ebay ireland), basically anywebsite which is large enough to have global appeal, now defaults to Ireland as my location.

I would put it down to a weird setting in firefox except it happens on all 3 PC's in the house and in IE.

I have the same IP address as I've had for the last 6 yrs using an ntl 255 modem and looking up my location with http://www.hostip.info/ clearly shows me as being in Norwich.

Could Virgin be routing my web traffic via Ireland for some reason?

Any help or suggestions would be gratefully received since this is driving me mad (you would be amazed how frustrating it is having to keep clicking through to UK sites, even with the BBC news and stuff)!

.M.
Anyone have any ideas?

[flowrebmit]

Click on the 'Connection' at the top of this page, and see if this Cableforum site can the see the same IP address that you believe that you have.

[mindcandy]

Ok, that done I get:

You do not appear to be on a Virgin Media Connection
Your IP address is 192.168.1.XXX
Your Proxy IP address is 82.XXX.193.XXX
This is not a known Virgin Media Proxy Server

Which is the same as the results I get from hostip and any other number of services;
IP address: 82.XXX.193.XXX
Location: Norwich, UNITED KINGDOM

Now this is (I believe) my IP address and has been since I got broadband.

What confuses me is why this website claims it is not a known Virgin Media Connection?
especially when my reverse dns is clearly an ntl connection based in Norwich "cpcX-norwX-X-X-custXXX.XXXX.cable.ntl.com."

IP address edited out for obvious reasons.

[flowrebmit]

Ok, that done I get:

You do not appear to be on a Virgin Media Connection
Your IP address is 192.168.1.XXX
Your Proxy IP address is 82.XXX.193.XXX
This is not a known Virgin Media Proxy Server

<snip>

That is really weird. I wasn't expecting to see a private network address (192.168.x.x) being seen by the Cableforum server - if it really is that is. The next thing I don't understand, is how your VM Cable Modem IP address is being seen as a Proxy server.

I'm clutching at straws, but could you try another web browser?

[mindcandy]

I run a ClarkConnect (Linux) hardware firewall/router to share out the broadband between my various PC's and perform a number of other tasks such as DMZ the lodgers PC, act as print server etc etc.

My machine (this PC) is obviously on the private network and the firewall does have web proxy and content management features enabled.

Still, I've checked with the guys at CC incase a recent patch or update has done something weird and the answer is a resounding no.

Which means I am still suffering with incorrect region issues and that has been tested with IE5.5, IE6, IE7 & Firefox now on 4 different PC's (all behind the firewall).

I'm gonna unplug the CC box tomorrow just incase those guys are wrong somehow but could Virgin be routing Norwich traffic or something?

I'm a little out of my depth now :(

[lucevans]

That is really weird. I wasn't expecting to see a private network address (192.168.x.x) being seen by the Cableforum server - if it really is that is. The next thing I don't understand, is how your VM Cable Modem IP address is being seen as a Proxy server.

I'm clutching at straws, but could you try another web browser?

clutching at straws even more than the previous respondent, but with the business going on at the moment regarding Phorm, could it be that you've been temporarily re-routed while VM install the new Phorm profiler hardware in your locality? Oooerr...

[chickendippers]

Have you tried connecting a PC to the modem directly and see what happens?

[flowrebmit]

clutching at straws even more than the previous respondent, but with the business going on at the moment regarding Phorm, could it be that you've been temporarily re-routed while VM install the new Phorm profiler hardware in your locality? Oooerr...

ROFL. I think we should keep that level of paranoia to just the one thread;)

---------- Post added at 20:48 ---------- Previous post was at 20:32 ----------

I'm gonna unplug the CC box tomorrow just incase those guys are wrong somehow but could Virgin be routing Norwich traffic or something?

I'm a little out of my depth now :(

Can you login into your CC box, and check the IP addresses of the Ethernet interfaces? i.e. at a console type /sbin/ifconfig.
The Ethernet interface connected to the cable modem should have your 82.x.x.x address, and the Ethernet port(or ports?) facing inwards should have a private address range.

Yes, try removing your CC box as you suggest to rule it out. If the problem still exists and it looks like a VM network problem, I think this is going to be a difficult one to get past the VM 1st level tech support! Maybe the moderators on Cableforum have some contacts?

[mindcandy]

From CC:

eth0 External Ethernet DHCP 82.XX.193.XX
eth1 LAN Ethernet Static 192.168.1.XXX

So pretty much as expected. Can I ask why the Cableforums 'connection' info says I'm not on a VM connection (or is this an old ntl hangover thing)?

[flowrebmit]

By the way, what I think is going on could be incorrect - because I don't understand internet tcp/ip data flows enought to understand how the cableforum server 'connection' dialog is showing both an IP address and proxy server (something new for me to learn about).

I suspect that as the far as the cableforum server is concerned your IP address is 192.168.x.x. This shouldn't be possible, as this address range isn't allowed out on the internet - VM shouldn't allow this address out onto the internet.

Your CC box has the 82.x.x.x IP address, this address is the one that the Cableforum server should be seeing as your IP address, but it is NOT. It's being seen as a proxy server??

Most likely cause is that the VM network is screwed up in your area, but you are going to have a hard time getting tech support to believe you - you really need a contact with a VM network tech. Also there is no point doing that until you disconnect the CC box and confirm that it isn't the problem.

[lucevans]

ROFL. I think we should keep that level of paranoia to just the one thread;)

For clarification flowrebmit, is that because it is technically not possible/likely, or because you're not interested in the OIX debate that going on right now?

[flowrebmit]

For clarification flowrebmit, is that because it is technically not possible/likely, or because you're not interested in the OIX debate that going on right now?

Truthfully, I am worn out trying to keep up with the Phorm thread (as important as it is), and I guess I was a little annoyed about it entering this thread because I was trying to distract myself in a non-Phorm related thread, sorry.

[mindcandy]

"Your CC box has the 82.x.x.x IP address, this address is the one that the Cableforum server should be seeing as your IP address, but it is NOT. It's being seen as a proxy server??"

I suspect much of this information is discovered by querying my browser rather than the connection itself - take a look over at http://gemal.dk/browserspy/ to get an idea of what information can be had from you regardless of most precautions.

[moaningmags]

I connect through a router so my comps IP addy is 192.168.1.8
Clicked on connection at top of page it says:-
Connection Information
You appear to be on a Virgin Media Connection
Your IP address is 82.XX.X.XXX
Host 82-XX-X-XXX cable.ubr01.uddi.blueyonder.co.uk

Either something on your setup isn't right or this is one for 2nd line.

[frogstamper]

I had a similar problem while using the BBC i-player, it wouldn't let me access it because apparently I was outside the UK. Anyway the bottom line was it was doing this because I has installed the "goggle web accelerator", as soon as I turned it off it was fine.

[flowrebmit]

"Your CC box has the 82.x.x.x IP address, this address is the one that the Cableforum server should be seeing as your IP address, but it is NOT. It's being seen as a proxy server??"

I suspect much of this information is discovered by querying my browser rather than the connection itself - take a look over at http://gemal.dk/browserspy/ to get an idea of what information can be had from you regardless of most precautions.

My understanding, is that every TCP/IP data packet has a To and From IP address, so when you fetch pages from a web server, by definition the server sees your IP address (or the IP address of any web proxy or web anonymiser if you are using one), the web server (e.g. Cableforum) has to know where to send the web pages. For this particular piece of information, your web browser isn't really leaking the information, it is just fundamental to the way networks work.

Note: I don't know for certain how the 'Connection' script is working.

---------- Post added at 06:37 ---------- Previous post was at 06:31 ----------

The Google Web Accelerator is a kind of web proxy. So web servers would see one of the Google's IP addresses, and not your ISP assigned IP address.