Methods and apparatus for determining the port and/or physical location of an IP device and for using that information
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Abstract
Methods and apparatus for providing location and other customer information corresponding to an IP addresses, including dynamically assigned IP address, are described. A port of an edge router is assigned to serve as a customer'"'"'s point of access to an IP based network. Customer information including the location of the customer premises from which the IP network is accessed through the assigned edge router port is stored in a database associating edge router and port information with customer information. When information about a customer using an IP address is desired a database associating IP addresses with edge routers, e.g., edge which acted as proxies to facilitate IP address leasing is consulted. The edge router corresponding to the IP address of interest is then contacted to determine the port number associated with the IP address. Recovered edge router and port number information is then used to access the customer information database.
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