GeoIP database issues and the real world consequences

Mon Apr 11 17:02:14 UTC 2016

TL;DR: GeoIP put unknown IP location mappings to the 'center of the country'
but then rounded off the lat long so it points at this farm.

Cant believe law enforcement is using this kind of info to execute searches.
Wouldnt that undermine the credibility of any evidence brought up in trials
for any geoip locates?

Seems to me locating unknowns somewhere in the middle of a big lake or park in
the center of the country might be a better idea.

/kc

On Mon, Apr 11, 2016 at 11:55:11AM -0500, Chris Boyd said:
  >
  >Interesting article.
  >
  >http://fusion.net/story/287592/internet-mapping-glitch-kansas-farm/
  >
  >An hour???s drive from Wichita, Kansas, in a little town called Potwin,
  >there is a 360-acre piece of land with a very big problem.
  >
  >The plot has been owned by the Vogelman family for more than a hundred
  >years, though the current owner, Joyce Taylor n??e Vogelman, 82, now
  >rents it out. The acreage is quiet and remote: a farm, a pasture, an old
  >orchard, two barns, some hog shacks and a two-story house. It???s the kind
  >of place you move to if you want to get away from it all. The nearest
  >neighbor is a mile away, and the closest big town has just 13,000
  >people. It is real, rural America; in fact, it???s a two-hour drive from
  >the exact geographical center of the United States.
  >
  >But instead of being a place of respite, the people who live on Joyce
  >Taylor???s land find themselves in a technological horror story.
  >
  >
  >For the last decade, Taylor and her renters have been visited by all
  >kinds of mysterious trouble. They???ve been accused of being identity
  >thieves, spammers, scammers and fraudsters. They???ve gotten visited by
  >FBI agents, federal marshals, IRS collectors, ambulances searching for
  >suicidal veterans, and police officers searching for runaway children.
  >They???ve found people scrounging around in their barn. The renters have
  >been doxxed, their names and addresses posted on the internet by
  >vigilantes. Once, someone left a broken toilet in the driveway as a
  >strange, indefinite threat.
  >
  >--Chris
  >