With more mobile users, the geo ip database is becoming useless

geolocationipmobile-devices

I've been enjoying the benefits of Geo IP lookup from database for some time. It's great.

People are increasingly trying to access my site from a mobile phones or 3G modems, and their physical location seems to have little relation to whereabouts my IP lookup tells me they are. A user who is on the east coast of my country, may be looked up as being in the far inland, or up north. And one user may be reported as being in one location in one moment, and seconds later, be 100s of kilometers away.

This is becoming a problem, and I need to find a solution. I am already updating my database monthly, but it has little effect.

What can be done?

Best Answer

One option is to use geolocation in the browser. Not many devices support it however. Ultimately, GeoIP is an unreliable hack.