Do you need to search for someone’s IP address using their mobile phone numbers? And you’re wondering if that’s possible or not and if you can get their real-time location or fake details? Then, read this guide.
I’ll show you the possible methods to find out an IP behind the number of your friend, colleague, or even a spammer that you’d like to identify and see the place from where they call or message.
A word about the reverse phone number lookup
This is the case where most people fall into the fake promises of sites they read from and follow. In reality, you can use a service such as Instant Checkmate and type the phone number of someone you need to identify. But keep in mind that you may get an address on the map and not an IP address. Even more, there is no way to view the real location on the Map through the IP of someone using these online tools.
If you find someone online who talks about that, be aware, it’s not true. You can’t get an IP address from just typing the number on reverse lookup tools.
Avoid fake online tools
Nowadays, there are many scams and spam sites or phone apps on both Android and iOS platforms that claim to show you someone’s IP address through their phone number and even for free. That’s in one word a waste of time and effort.
Don’t just use any of those apps just because of their false claims. There is no actual technology that tracks the IP behind cell phones and shares that data as easily as that.
These apps claiming these false promises never care about you. But they care about ads that show and earn from. So, be careful next time you use a mysterious app just to see the IP address of some you can’t identify. That brings problems and nothing as a result.
The cell phone IP address lookup works only when that device is connected to the Internet. And by typing someone’s IP into such tools, you get a large circle on that Map that shows the city and nothing more.
Can you get the real-time IP?
Remember that when you use a phone number and connect to the Internet, the device uses a publicly shared IP that changes every time you turn On and OFF the cellular data.
Even more, that IP changes automatically when you let the device work on cellular data for many hours or days depending on many factors. The cellular tower gives that same IP to others. Also, it’s nearly impossible to tell at 100% which device used that IP at that specific time.
In other words, we all use the IP address of thousands or millions of other people around us in the same location. So, even if you find a “secret” way to extract that IP from someone’s mobile device or through its number, you only get a mysterious IP that could change at any time if it’s not fake and hidden behind a VPN or proxy.
Also, be aware that the IP addresses change with location. That means when you move to another city or state, that IP also changes. The same happens with other people’s devices. When they move, they connect using temporarily different IP addresses. That way, it becomes so hard to trace them in any way.
Can you track an IP address from a phone call?
There are myths about tracking people’s IP when they’re calling or texting. In fact, the IP of a cell phone is owned by the cellular provider which changes automatically or when the person connects to the Internet next time.
This means, even if you install a software that tracks the IP in real-time, that’s a temporary IP of the cellular provider and not the device. The device has a Mac address and IMEI that could help in finding details about the location etc, but not the IP.
Do phones have IP addresses?
The short answer is yes, but the phone gets a temporary IP that changes the next time that person connects to online sites or the Internet in general. Consequently, we can’t say that an IP address belongs to someone’s phone or its number. But we can say, a specific IP address is being used by someone’s phone at that time. The wireless service provider gives that IP through Wifi or cellular data.
That’s why investigation agencies like the FBI rely on the Mac address of the device, or its hidden cellular tower details like IMEI to locate the caller on the Map precisely.
An IP address can be traced only when the device is connected through Wifi or cellular data. Hence, that comes with limitations especially when the person behind the phone is using a VPN that hides the real IP.
Now, suppose that you collected some data about a person. But what can you do with someone’s IP? The answer depends on two scenarios:
- If that person is using a mobile phone, the problem is that you can’t do anything with that IP. The reason is because other people will get that same IP when they connect to a website or just turn the data ON.
- In the case when that person is using a static IP, then, you can see the location (city only) on the Map of that person but not precisely.
Accuracy of IP geolocation
Lots of people confuse IP addresses with GPS locations that are completely different. An IP address uses the Internet or cellular data tower to work. On the other side, a GPS uses satellite signals to work. IP address geolocation is approximate in real time of course.
So, when you see that a guy is using an IP, and you copy and paste it into online IP address locator sites, you get up to 75% of accuracy in the United States and in some EU countries.
That’s like what the ip-lookup.org site shows within a radius of 35 Kilometers which is a lot. Imagine that you search for someone and you can see the IP he used. Now, getting a general location within 35 km or 21 Miles won’t help you a lot.
Contrary, a GPS is more precise, and it can show you the location of someone based on their latitude and longitude data with a few meters error margin.
Now, for other countries, worldwide, that accuracy will be useless as you may get a city that’s 400 Miles away from that IP address you typed even if it’s your own phone. So, relying on the IP address just to know the location of the caller behind it is not that useful there. You can just know the country in most cases.
Conclusion
A phone number on its own doesn’t provide you with any IP address behind it. So, it’s not that easy to believe what many websites talk about. The IP of any device changes with every new connection to the Web. Also, there is no public technology that links an IP address to someone’s mobile phone as easily as it looks like. Of course, investigation agencies have their own tools and technologies that are exclusive to federal research, and you can’t use them in any way.
On the other hand, you can find more details about someone using their phone number such as the address, name etc…And in all cases, there is no real-time IP location tracking just by typing that person’s phone number in a search box, that’s a lie you need to be aware of.
