The 7 Best Free & Paid IP Address Blocker Methods

Regular visitors to this website should be familiar with what an IP address is. However, if you’re new to the site, or if you’ve simply never really considered how the internet works, here’s a short explanation of what an IP address is.

Every device that connects to the internet is assigned an IP address, which is used to identify the device. This unique address allows other devices on the internet to identify which device sent a request for information, and where the reply should be sent.

This is much like how your home or business address works in the real world.

Plus, since each country is assigned a unique range of IP addresses for use by connected devices inside its borders, an IP address can also be used to identify a device’s geographical location.

This allows websites, online services and internet-capable apps to detect and track your location. The sites, services or apps can then determine whether to provide access to their content based on the device’s IP address.

This means that if you can block a website, app or service from detecting your real IP address, you can prevent any tracking of your online activities and possibly gain access to geo-blocked content that is normally not available in your area of the world.

In this article, I’ll explain how you can block your IP address, what methods you can use to block your IP address, and explain the pros and cons of each blocking method.

But first, let’s take a look at the two types of IP addresses used on the internet.

IP Address Types

IPv4 IP Addresses

An IPv4 address is a unique 32-bit number that is assigned to a connected device, which allows other devices on the internet or an internal network to identify it.

An IPv4 address is assigned in the following format: x.x.x.x, where the value of x can be any number from 0 to 255. For example, on my home network, my Mac is currently assigned the following IPv4 address: 192.168.0.167. This address is unique on my home network, and only my Mac uses it.

Meanwhile, my public-facing IP address is actually the IP address assigned to my ISP-provided modem. It too is an IPv4 address, and no, it is none of your business what that IP address is. 😉

This IPv4 IP addressing scheme allows 4,294,967,296 different address combinations.

While you’d think that nearly 4.3 billion IP addresses would be enough for anyone, the proliferation of connected devices (computers, mobile devices, Internet of Things devices, automobiles and numerous other devices) have quickly depleted the number of available IP addresses. Enter IPv6.

IPv6 IP Addresses

IPv6 was developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) in response to the above-mentioned depletion of IPv4 IP addresses.

IPv6 is a 128-bit addressing scheme, and allows 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 addresses (approximately 3.4×10³⁸ ).

IPv6 addresses are represented as eight groups, separated by colons, of four hexadecimal digits, such as 2001:0db8:0000:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334.

What Is an IP Address Blocker

An IP address blocker is an app or service that prevents others on the internet from detecting and monitoring your real IP address by hiding it behind another, proxy-provided, new IP address.

IP address blocking is usually accomplished by using some type of proxy, which can take the form of a VPN, an HTTPS proxy, the Tor network and other types of proxies.

In this section of the article, I’ll share a look at 7 different types of proxies that you can use to block your real IP address.

1. A VPN

A Virtual Private Network (VPN) routes your internet connection through one of numerous VPN servers located in countries around the globe. This hides your device’s real IP address, and the internet then identifies your device by using the VPN-provided IP address.

Many VPNs share dynamic IP addresses, which means your device uses the same IP address as other devices that are connected to the VPN server, providing additional anonymity by making it difficult to trace any of your online activities back specifically to your device.

In addition to blocking your real IP address, a VPN also provides improved online security by encrypting your internet connection, preventing third parties from monitoring and tracking your online activities.

Also, by assigning a new IP address to your device, it allows you to access geo-blocked content, such as streaming sites, that might normally be unavailable to you in your region of the world.

My top VPN recommendation is NordVPN, which operates thousands of servers in multiple locations around the world. The provider excels in providing fast, well-protected connections to most of the globe, offering comprehensive customer support, as well as native app support for most popular device platforms. For more information about NordVPN, read my review.

It should be noted that there are free VPNs available, but I’ve found that they’re not worth using, due to their privacy, performance and convenience shortcomings.

2. SOCKS Proxies

While SOCKS proxies are similar to VPNs, not all versions offer encrypted protection, meaning your online activities could still be monitored before it reaches the proxy server. This means your ISP, the government or hackers could monitor your online travels.

While SOCKS5 does offer support for encryption, it is not required. If you do enable encryption, your connection will be slower but more secure.

If you use a SOCKS proxy, it does not automatically block your IP address for all online activity. Instead, each individual app must be configured to use the SOCKS proxy. Any app used with it must be configured in its own settings.

SOCKS proxies are available from some VPN providers, including NordVPN.

SOCKS proxies are also available in free or paid versions, but I strongly suggest you avoid the free versions.

3. HTTP & HTTPS Proxies

HTTP and HTTPS proxies are generally found in the form of browser extensions or plugins for browsers like Chrome, Edge and Safari. These proxies will block your IP address when using the web browser, but all other computer activity will still use your direct ISP-provided connection.

An HTTP proxy will hide your IP address from the websites you visit inside the browser. However, the connection is not encrypted, so all of your browser activity is left open to being monitored.

An HTTPS proxy also hides your real IP address, but also uses SSL encryption, which encrypts your browser activity. These types of proxies are usually offered by VPN providers in addition to their apps. While apps encrypt all of your computer’s online activity, the HTTPS proxy only encrypts your in-browser activity.

Many VPN providers offer browser extensions and plugins, including such well-known providers as NordVPN, Surfshark, ExpressVPN, CyberGhost and others.

Please be warned that when using an HTTPS proxy that you could still be leaking DNS, WebRTC, and other types of internet traffic outside of the proxy. This information can be used to determine your actual IP address and your physical location. For full protection, you’ll need to use a VPN app.

4. SSH (Secure Shell) Proxy

Also called an SSH tunnel, SSH proxies are less common than the first three proxies I’ve listed above, but you can manually set up an SSH proxy on most operating systems.

An SSH proxy routes your internet connection through a proxy server by using the SSH protocol. While SSH uses strong encryption to protect your connection, it slows things down considerably, and may cause certain apps and websites to not function properly.

While setting up an SSH proxy is fairly simple and can be set up using an SSH client like PuTTY, it is beyond the scope of this article. For information on how to set up an SSH proxy, visit the Berkeley website.

5. Tor Browser

The Tor Browser (“The Onion Router”) was created by the Tor Project, who created the browser to provide “private access to an uncensored web.”

The Tor Browser routes its traffic through the anonymous Tor network, which is a series of randomized nodes, which is essentially a series of proxy servers that encrypt your connection several times, routing it through at least three different nodes. Each node strips a layer of encryption until it reaches an “exit node.”

Websites only see the IP address of the exit node. No node in the chain can detect or monitor the source, destination or content of Tor-based internet traffic.

While the Tor Browser is an effective tool for IP address blocking, there are drawbacks.

Due to the multiple rounds of encryption and the need to travel through several nodes before reaching a destination, Tor will greatly slow your internet browsing. This means it is usually acceptable only for basic web browsing. Other browser activities, such as streaming, will not perform satisfactorily.

While the Tor Browser provides excellent protection for your online browsing (political activists and journalists in totalitarian countries use it to protect their online activity), it is also unfortunately a popular tool among the criminal set.

Since your ISP can detect when you are using the Tor Browser, this could trigger increased surveillance by both your ISP and the government.

6. Disable IPv4 or IPv6

You must have either IPv4 or IPv6 enabled in order to access the internet. This means you can disable one or the other, but not both.

Since most websites, services and apps use IPv4, you can probably safely block your IPv6 address by disabling it on your device. While you can leave IPv6 enabled and disable IPv4, don’t expect everything on the internet to work properly.

You may find that IPv6 is disabled by default on your router. How you check the IPv6 settings varies by router manufacturer and model of router. Check with your router manufacturer for information on how to view and edit your router’s IPv6 settings. If your router has IPv6 disabled, you don’t need to worry about disabling IPv6 on individual devices.

To disable IPv6 in Windows 10, do the following:

1. Open the Control Panel.
2. Set the “View by” option in the top-right corner to “Large icons.“
3. Click “Network and Sharing Center.”
4. Click “Change adapter settings” in the left panel.
5. Right-click on the active network adapter and select “Properties.“
6. Go to the “Networking” tab.
7. Uncheck the “Internet Protocol Version 6 (TCP/IPv6)” option.
8. Click the “Ok” button.
9. Close all of the windows you opened in the previous steps.

Disabling IPv6 on Mac OS X and macOS can vary according to which version you are running. For more information, visit the Apple Support website.

7. Hide Your Device’s Private IP Address by Using a NAT Firewall

You probably already have a NAT firewall in place, whether you know it or not. A NAT firewall is usually included in most WiFi routers.

A NAT firewall hides the structure of your internal home or business network from outsiders, increasing network security.

A NAT firewall only allows internet traffic to pass through the firewall’s gateway if a connected device on the local network requested it. Any unrequested data packets are discarded, which prevents communication with dangerous devices on the internet, such as hackers who may try to take control of devices on the network.

If the NAT firewall sees inbound traffic that was not requested by an IP address on the internal network, the firewall knows the traffic should be discarded and not forwarded to the network device.

Other devices on the internet can only see the router’s public IP address, and none of the private IP addresses on the internal network. This protects your Internet of Things devices, smartphones, tablets, computers, gaming consoles, smart TVs and other connected devices from external attacks.

Computers and servers on the internet can only see the public IP address of the router and none of the private IP addresses of specific devices, like phones, laptops, smart TVs, Internet of  Things devices and game consoles.

Most modern home and business routers include a NAT Firewall option straight out of the box. You may need to manually enable the firewall portion of the feature according to which router makes and model you use.

Conclusion

As you can see, there are multiple ways to block your IP address from being detected by the rest of the internet. While some are more efficient and easy to use than others, all of the methods we’ve looked at will do the job.

I myself rely on my favorite online security tool, a VPN, to mask my IP address. A VPN not only temporarily assigns a fresh IP address to your connected device (hiding your real IP address), it also hides your online activities from prying eyes by encrypting your connection. Plus, that fresh IP address opens up a new world of online content that you might normally never see.