How the NNTP psting host gets added to the post is dependent on the
software that injects the posting into the newsfeed. This software is
probably at your ISP, which means they get to set the policy of how it
is set. If you want to truly change it, you need to either find an
ISP specific solution, or use a different method of getting your news
into the newsfeed. Whether there exists an ISP specific solution,
depends on your ISP. For example, my ISP does not associate my
postings with my computer--in fact, it doesn't even know the name, IP,
or MAC address of my computer.

Now, when I talk about my ISP (The World), I'm not talking about my
cable provider, which is what connects my home to the (and does know
my computers IP and MAC address) internet, nor the way my work setup
is connected to the internet either. I am talking about a specifc
company that provides exactly the service of getting mail and news
from the internet and posting news onto the internet--thus I should
probably really call it my mail/news service provider. I do that for
exactly the opposite reason of what you are asking for, so that I have
a well know address that people can reach me at that doesn't change
over the years. However, one could use it to get what you want
privacy.

I have also used "free email" addresses to get something closer to the
anonymity you are seeking. Those are relatively effective. You can
use those to create postings, if you learn how, and if so, you are
likely to be mostly anonymous, and your posting won't be easily
(i.e. by your kids) tracked back to you, unless they hire a
professional.

If they hire a professional to track down your information, you aren't
likely to be able to get the privacy you desire. (So, for instance, if
you are cheating on your husband, he will find that information out,
even if you try to keep it private. Noreover, he will find out not
via tracking your internet posting IPs. As they say, been there, done
that.) You should also assume that most "kooks" are capable of doing
what professionals do.

In other words, a motivated person can break your privacy shield. An
unmotivated person will probably never know (nor care that) you are
trying to keep something private. There are simple things that can
assist your privacy. Using a free email service to create a
"disposable" email address is one of them. Trying to hide your home
computers posting address, is not one of them. If you want to
disassociate from some posting, DON'T DO IT FROM YOUR HOME COMPUTER.

If you are ashamed of your previous postings, sorry it is too late.
You are better off figuring out how to deal with your choices of
actions, rather than trying to hide from them.

You keep trying the attention of this thread on how to hide your
IP/NNTP posting host. You may or may not be able to do that via an
ISP specific solution. Most DSL modems and routers aren't designed to
make it easy for you to change their IP address by forcing them to
renew it. Keeping the IP address constant is an efficiency issue. It
is generally more useful to keep the address constant, than it is to
change it. However, with a server that has more potential modems
connected than addresses, it is useful to "release" addresses of
modems that aren't connected, because the assumption is that most
modems are not connected, because they can't all be connected, given
that there aren't enough addresses. Therefore, your ISP may recycle
IP addresses, to serve a large community with fewer resources. Still,
that is for their benefit not yours, and how often they recycle
addresses may (or may not) be something you can influence. You can
play with your modem settings (and it is more likely the modem
settings if you have a separate modem and router--note my modem has NO
user configurable settings). However, even if you change them, you may
have to turn your modem off to get it to release the IP address.
Moorever, your IP may reassign the same IP address when your modem is
turned back on, if that is convenient to them, and quite likely will
give you the same address if your modem is off for a sufficiently
short period of time.

Note, if your modem has a MAC address, I defintely recommend NOT
trying to change that. It is quite likely that your ISP keeps a list
of the valid MAC addresses for the modems connected to its service,
and only allows those MAC addresses to connect. By the way, many ISPs
use the MAC address of the first "computer" (or router) after the
modem as the address they keep in their database (at least that's what
my last 3 cable providers have done). That's one of the reasons many
home routers allow one to override the hardwired MAC address, so that
one can make it look like the computer the network was originally
"provisioned" for. Thus, I wouldn't change the routers MAC address
either.

However, the key point of all of this, is that if you want your
postings/email to come from a different address, then do that. Use a
different way of injecting your eamil/news into the web rather than
simply posting from your home. However, don't try to achieve that by
fiddling with your local computers IP address. Wrong solution to the
problem.

Hope this helps,
-Chris

************************************************** ***************************
Chris Clark Internet : compres@world.std.com
Compiler Resources, Inc. Web Site : http://world.std.com/~compres
23 Bailey Rd voice : (508) 435-5016
Berlin, MA 01503 USA fax : (978) 838-0263 (24 hours)
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