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[richardg]

Hi, I hope someone can help me.

I recently unlocked my sky  netgear router (the white one) using the very helpful instructions on this site and it  works petfect, thank you. However, the reason I unlocked is because I recently moved house and changed isp from sky to talktalk. TTs router was painful - only allowed 1  device to connect at a time, 404s etc. So I have got the netgear working and all is great except it seems to be locked to my old home address. I have a couple of smartphones which connect to the WiFi, both display location specific data such as weather, etc. Both when connected to home WiFi say I am at my old address in Kent not west cornwall where I live now! Is there anyway I can change this? I couldn't find anything in the router settings....

Many thanks for your help in advance

[BritBrat]

I don't think that will be anything to do with the router.

Try reseting the connection on one of your phones.

[roseway]

Hi and welcome

I confess that I don't know anything about smartphones, but I'm sure this information isn't kept in the router. It must be wherever the smartphone configuration is held.

[richardg]

Hi

Thanks for the replies. I thought this too  at first. Both phones are set to 'receive location information from wireless networks'. Also when the previous talktalk router did work the phones showed the correct location. Because of this and that the address which pops up now being the exact address of my previous house where I got the router from sky makes me think it is the router. Weird eh?!

MAC addresses aren't all on some national address table are they?

[BritBrat]

I know very little about smart phone either but I would guess your location settings are nothing to do with TalkTalk router or the netgear.

Try this:

Go outside for 10 mins with phone and see if it gets a GPS connection and then see what location it states.

I am working on the idea that you have to get the data from GPS.

[richardg]

Hi britbrat

thanks for the reply. Yes the gps works fine for location. Also, when i am away from my router with gps turned off the location picks up correctly from the mobile phone signal too. I only jump back to kent from cornwall when connected to my old now unlocked sky router in my house...

[waltergmw]

Hi Richard,

The following are just guesses and not knowledge of the systems involved.

Have you tried searching your computer(s) for words included in your Kent address ?
Have you cleared all your browsers' caches etc. ?
Have you power-failed & Rebooted all the phones?
If you can't find any local configuration data another possibility might just be that the old modem is picking up your old Sky account data stored within their customer's database which perhaps hasn't been erased ?

It does seem rather unlikely and very strange but one has to wonder how much account data is stored and for how long?

Kind regards,
Walter

[BritBrat]

Like Walter said but it could be in the phone provider database.

I think it is when you do not have a GPS location and maybe no signal on the phone it defaults to phone service provider data address location.

Can you login to the provider and change your address?

Puts foil hat on top of my mobile.


I still can't think it has anything to do with the router, after all you have wiped all data that was on it when you flashed it.  Having said that have you done a factory restore?

[richardg]

Thanks Walter and Britbrat.

I have just been going through all my phone settings, and google account settings (they are android smartphones) and nothing is there showing my old address.

I also tried logging in to my old sky account to change any addresses there but this is now closed since I moved house in May so no more access for me there.

The flashing I did I did following the advice on this website. Im not sure what a factory restore is though. I did press the reset button on the back after completion of the flashing for 10 seconds if this is it (the login is now admin not sky so i guess this reset worked)?

Thanks again for all your help. Curious how this is not common after all people seem to sell sky routers and flash them quite often...

[richardg]

BINGO! I think I have it! and yes it looks like it was not a router problem but good old uncle google. I searched their android forums and found a link to a google form for reporting incorrectly identified locations on WiFi. Seems it is google who have the database of where everyone and everything is - i'm trying not to be scared about that! Anyway, I have let them know of the error, let's see what happens....

Thank you all again for your help!

Richard

[HPsauce]

Could this be anything to do with their alleged "gathering" of WiFi network data by their streetview cars?
If so, changing the name of your wireless network (and securing it) would be a good start.

[richardg]

Could be!

Already secured WPA2 PSK and name changed when I flashed. Just set the SSID to not broadcast if that helps. But i guess if google want to see they will find a way!!

[BritBrat]

Google hey,

I would never have thought about that, just as well Google did not street me I guess.

[Alex Atkin UK]

One good thing I have found about all this, as I use a directional antenna to beam my wireless across the road they did not correctly locate my router.  Its good, because it does know I am nearby, but because my signal is beaming off in one direction it places me about 300M too far  in the direction my antenna is facing, which is the middle of the local park.  So unless someone knows what to look for, I could live anywhere on the outskirts of the park.

So if you do NOT want Google to know exactly where you are, a directional antenna could be a good move.  They can only position you based on signal strength of your WiFi as they drive along the roads so any obstructions in that signal in any direction will skew their results.

I have to admit though, I haven't tested what it does if I stand outside right in front of the antenna, only inside behind it where the signal is weaker than it would be using the standard radial antenna.  Still, its interesting.

[BritBrat]

Maybe it was nothing to do with the router:
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2007/112807-google-mobile-phones-cell-towers.html