Every PC can be identified via the internet

Tadayoshi Kohno has found a way to track every PC on the internet. Even PCs with varying IP addresses can be identified by a University of California student.

The way of tracing is still called ‘fingerprinting’, with which it is even possible to find out operating systems on certain PCs. Even Linux and mobile operating systems can be traced.

Tadayoshi Kohno: “We have developed this idea into fingerprinting the hardware, without the device in question having to cooperate. The fingerprinting technique uses information in the TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) headers to determine a computer’s clock skew, which is caused by small deviations in the hardware. The techniques work even if a computer is thousands of kilometers away, there are several hops between the measuring device and the computer itself and is not dependent on the technology used to connect to the internet.”