Abstract
Geolocation, the mapping of a network entity with its geographical position is used frequently in today’s internet. New location aware applications like e-commerce, web site content and advertisements are just some examples of what has appeared since the last couple of years. Regarding network security, Geolocation also has a significant impact, since it offers possibilities for advanced network security (e.g., including sophisticated geo-based attack correlation/classification). However, determining the physical position of a network entity is challenging, as there is no inherent relationship between an IP address and its geographical location. In addition, with the introduction of IPv6, the address space is enhanced by a factor of 296 making the process far more complex in comparison to IPv4. Although numerous techniques for Geolocation are existing, each strategy is subject to certain restrictions. Therefore, this publication illustrates and evaluates different approaches of Geolocation. Furthermore, strategies to obtain additional information related to the location of IP addresses are examined. After considering procedures how to verify the achieved data and following the ideas of Endo et al., we are designing an architecture for a combination of different methods for optimized Geolocation. Finally we introduce and evaluate our Proof of Concept called geolabel, a tool capable of mapping IPv4 as well as IPv6 addresses to certain geographical locations on a country level.
Keywords
- IP Geolocation
- IPv6
- prosecution of computer fraud
- attack attribution
- network analysis
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Koch, R., Golling, M., Rodosek, G.D. (2013). Geolocation and Verification of IP-Addresses with Specific Focus on IPv6. In: Wang, G., Ray, I., Feng, D., Rajarajan, M. (eds) Cyberspace Safety and Security. CSS 2013. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8300. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-03584-0_12
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