Detect users country for preselect in php dropdown

Question

I would like to detect users country, so to preselect it in drop-down list in my php form. I tried to do it by getting users ip address and then I used Maxmind Geoip to get country name from ip. Everything works fine except when user is behind vpn, and this is when I cannot get the real ip (and so the country) of user if he/she is behind proxy or use VPN.

I read some similar post such as How to get Real IP from Visitor? and What is the most accurate way to retrieve a user's correct IP address in PHP?, and tried $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'], $_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR'], getenv('REMOTE_ADDR'), etc. but none of them returned original ip when I am behind vpn.

I am really interested to know if there is any way to get the user real ip (e.g I am very curious to know how some websites like http://whatismyip.com return the original ip?). If really it is not possible to obtain this original ip in php as is said in this post, is there any other way to detect user country? (I also thought about browser language, but I think it would not be useful in my case, since e.g many users might set it to English while they belong to other countries)

Any idea would be highly appreciated,

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Sep 23 '14 at 14:14

Theoretically it is always possible to track down a ip if you have access to ISP's etc.. However, from a programmers perspective there is no certain way to know the visitors real ip address hence you will never have 100% accuracy. There are things you can do to improve accuracy such as you have suggested $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'], $_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR']. Perhaps someone else can help you crack down on more methods that will improve accuracy

Stanimir Stoyanov · Answer 2 · 2014-09-23T15:05:49.600

0

Because IP blocks are being constantly moving through ISPs it is not an easy task to gather up-to-date database for your applications.

Here is an example with one of the free APIs:

function get_ip_details($ip_address)  
{  
    //function to find country, city and country code from IP.  

    //verify the IP.  
    ip2long($ipAddr)== -1 || ip2long($ipAddr) === false ? trigger_error("Invalid IP", E_USER_ERROR) : "";  

    //get the JSON result from hostip.info  
    $result = file_get_contents("http://api.hostip.info/get_json.php?ip=".$ip_address);  

    $result = json_decode($result, 1);  

    //return the array containing city, country and country code  
    return $result;  
}

The result would be something similar to this json response

Also, most modern web browsers have this future already built-in, so you can get the user's country on-the-fly without 3rd party APIs: Demo

Edit: In OPs case it is impossible to recognize user's country.

edited Sep 23 '14 at 15:05

answered Sep 23 '14 at 14:25

Stanimir Stoyanov

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sorry but I am not looking for another API to show the country based on ip (This is what I had done by Maxmind GeoIP), my problem is related to when user is e.g behind vpn, it returns vpn ip address! I wanna get the original one even in this case.. I hope I could clarify my question;) – mOna Sep 23 '14 at 14:32
Well, unfortunately there is no option to get the actual IP which is behind VPN. Even regular proxy server could be configured in a way not to set the HTTP_X_FORWARDED_FOR header. – Stanimir Stoyanov Sep 23 '14 at 14:44
So, do u know any other method to detect user country? (I mean not by ip)? :| – mOna Sep 23 '14 at 14:51
Well, you can recognize one client by its cookies and/or by its IP address. Cookies are not useful in your case so, I believe that it is mission impossible, sorry. – Stanimir Stoyanov Sep 23 '14 at 15:03

Detect users country for preselect in php dropdown

2 Answers2