Method, apparatus, and system for determining a location corresponding to an IP address

• US 10,277,480 B2
• Filed: 09/29/2017
• Issued: 04/30/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 03/17/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Advanced New Technologies Company Limited (Ant Group Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.
• Inventors: Li, Xiaojian, Hong, Manhuo
• Primary Examiner(s): Bui, Jonathan A
• Application Number:
  US15/720,364
• Publication Number:
  US 20180026859A1
• Time in Patent Office: 578 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/604 Address structures or formats
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/668 Internet protocol [IP] address subnets
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2101/69 using geographic information, e.g. room number
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/12 Discovery or management of network topologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/00 Arrangements for monitoring or testing data switching networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/00 Network arrangements, protocols or services for addressing or naming

Abstract

Determining a location corresponding to an Internet Protocol (IP) address includes collecting an IP address and location information corresponding to the IP address, wherein the location information corresponding to the IP address includes information identifying a location from which a terminal associated with the IP address accesses a network, obtaining one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data for the IP address using the IP address and the location information corresponding to the IP address, determining geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address based at least in part on the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data, determining an IP address field based at least in part on the geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address, and determining a location corresponding to the IP address field.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

obtaining an Internet Protocol (IP) address, wherein the IP address is included in a message associated with an access to a network;

obtaining one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data for the IP address based at least in part on the IP address;

determining geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address based at least in part on the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data;

determining an IP address field comprising a set of one or more IP addresses based at least in part on the geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address; and

determining a location corresponding to the IP address field.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein each of the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponds to a different accessing of the network.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining location information corresponding to the IP address.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the location information corresponding to the IP address includes information identifying a location from which a terminal associated with the IP address accesses a network.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data is further obtained based at least in part on the location information corresponding to the IP address.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein the obtained IP address and the obtained location information corresponding to the IP address are among a plurality of IP addresses and location information respectively corresponding to the plurality of IP addresses.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the IP address field being determined is among a plurality of IP address fields determined based at least in part on respective geographic coordinates corresponding to each of the plurality of IP addresses.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the determining of the IP address field comprises segmenting the plurality of IP addresses into the plurality of IP address fields.

9. The method of claim 6, wherein the determining of the geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address based at least in part on the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data comprises:

determining, for each of the plurality of IP addresses, a respective weight of each of the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponding to a particular IP address of the plurality of IP addresses; and

determining the geographic coordinates corresponding to the particular IP address based at least in part on the weight of each of the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponding to the particular IP address.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the determining, for each IP address, the weight of each of the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponding to the particular IP address comprises:

acquiring the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data that occur is within a predetermined range of locations corresponding to the IP address; and

determining the weight of each of the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data according to a number of days on which one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data occur within the predetermined range of locations.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the determining of the geographic coordinates corresponding to the particular IP address based at least in part on the weight of each of the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponding to the particular IP address comprises:

determining geographic coordinates in the IP address geographic coordinate data having a greatest weight among the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponding to the particular IP address to be the geographic coordinates corresponding to the particular IP address.

12. The method of claim 9, wherein the determining of the geographic coordinates corresponding to the particular IP address based at least in part on the weight of each of the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponding to the particular IP address comprises:

extracting a threshold number of pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data having greatest weight among one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data corresponding to the particular IP address; and

determining the geographic coordinates corresponding to the particular IP address based at least in part on distances between locations corresponding to the threshold number of pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data having the greatest weight.

13. The method of claim 7, wherein the determining of the plurality of IP address fields based at least in part on respective geographic coordinates corresponding to each of the plurality of IP addresses comprises:

ranking the collected IP addresses according to a predetermined order;

determining a respective distance between the corresponding geographic coordinates corresponding to each pair of adjacent IP addresses of the ranked collected IP addresses; and

dividing the collected IP addresses into the plurality of IP address fields according to the respective distances between the geographic coordinates corresponding to each pair of adjacent IP addresses.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the dividing of the plurality of collected IP addresses into the plurality of IP address fields according to the respective distances between the geographic coordinates corresponding to each pair of adjacent IP addresses comprises:

regarding a smaller IP address of two adjacent IP addresses which are an nth pair of adjacent IP addresses whose adjacent distance exceeds a threshold distance as an ending IP address of an nth IP address field;

regarding a larger IP address of two adjacent IP addresses which are an (n−

1)th pair of adjacent IP addresses whose adjacent distance exceeds the threshold distance as a beginning IP address of the nth IP address field; and

determining based on the nth IP address field, wherein n is an integer greater than or equal to 1 and wherein, when n is equal to 1, the first IP address is regarded as the starting IP address of the 1st IP address field.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the dividing of the collected IP addresses into the plurality of IP address fields according to the respective distances between the geographic coordinates corresponding to each pair of adjacent IP addresses comprises:

determining a mean distance between the geographic coordinates corresponding to each particular IP address in a particular IP address field and the geographic coordinates corresponding to an IP address before the particular IP address to determine whether the mean distance exceeds a threshold mean distance; and

in the event that the mean distance exceeds the threshold mean distance, determining all IP addresses arranged in order before the particular IP address within the particular IP address field to be a new IP address field, wherein the IP address before the particular IP address is regarded as an ending IP address of the new IP address field and the original starting IP address of the particular IP address field is regarded as a starting IP address of the new IP address field, and wherein the particular IP address and all the IP addresses arranged in order following the particular IP address are determined to belong to another new IP address field, wherein the particular IP address is regarded as a starting IP address of the other new IP address field and the ending IP address of the particular IP address field is regarded as an ending IP address of the other new IP address field.

16. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

measuring a quantity of missing IP addresses between each pair of adjacent IP addresses in a particular IP address field; and

in the event that the measured quantity of missing IP addresses between a particular pair of adjacent IP addresses exceeds a threshold quantity, further dividing the particular IP address field according to the particular pair of adjacent IP addresses.

17. The method of claim 3, wherein the determining of the location further comprises:

receiving an IP address for which a location is to be determined;

determining the IP address field to which the IP address for which the location is to be determined belongs; and

determining the geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address field associated with the IP address for which the location is to be determined.

18. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

sending, to a user, context-based information according to the location corresponding to the IP address field.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the context-based information corresponds to one of a product and a service available within a predetermined range of geographic locations in which the location corresponding to the IP address field is located.

20. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a location based service to a terminal associated with the message based at least in part on the determined location corresponding to the IP address field.

21. A device comprising:

one or more processors configured to;

obtain an Internet Protocol (IP) address, wherein the IP address is included in a message associated with an access to a network;

obtain one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data for the IP address based at least in part on the IP address;

determine geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address based at least in part on the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data;

determine an IP address field comprising a set of one or more IP addresses based is at least in part on the geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address; and

determine a location corresponding to the IP address field; and

one or more memories coupled to the one or more processors, configured to provide the one or more processors with instructions.

22. A computer program product, the computer program product being embodied in a tangible non-transitory computer-readable storage medium and comprising computer instructions that are executed to perform the steps of:

obtaining an Internet Protocol (IP) address, wherein the IP address is included in a message associated with an access to a network;

obtaining one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data for the IP address based at least in part on the IP address;

determining geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address based at least in part on the one or more pieces of IP address geographic coordinate data;

determining an IP address field comprising a set of one or more IP addresses based at least in part on the geographic coordinates corresponding to the IP address; and

determining a location corresponding to the IP address set.