Apple's two stage verification gets my location wrong every time?

[Cakefish]

So whenever I log in with my Apple ID on any device I get a prompt on my iPad asking to confirm that log in attempt. But it always says that I'm trying to log in from London. This is an issue because I live over a 100 miles away from London (in the UK). So the security seems lax here. How do I know if a log in attempt was created by myself or someone else when my location is always shown as London, hundreds of miles from where I currently live?

 

[Powermax]

That is because Apple estimates your location according to your IP address and since your connecting point is always London it's probably not possible to get a better estimation.

 

[Jnesbitt82]

So whenever I log in with my Apple ID on any device I get a prompt on my iPad asking to confirm that log in attempt. But it always says that I'm trying to log in from London. This is an issue because I live over a 100 miles away from London (in the UK). So the security seems lax here. How do I know if a log in attempt was created by myself or someone else when my location is always shown as London, hundreds of miles from where I currently live?

I have the same issue except mine says the login location is near a college campus in Cincinnati, Ohio. I'm about 75 miles away.

Check this out.
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/apples-two-factor-authentication-issue.2038898/

 

[OriginalAppleGuy]

Internet logins. Wherever your network hits the internet is where it will say you are logging in. Cell companies are fun for this. Many times my cell phone on AT&T connects somewhere north of me several states away. It can be a bit disconcerting but don't let it bother you too much. It's just how the network (internet) works.

 

[flyinmac]

Seems Apple should find a better way to identify a device's location.

Two step verification is exact and precise on my location on my Mac. But my cell phone was said to be a thousand miles away from me. One AppleTV came up 600 miles away, another AppleTV exactly where I am, and another AppleTV about 10 miles away.

Keep in mind, I logged them all in within 5 minutes of each other. All on the same home network. And my IP address is static (hasn't changed in years).

And of course, my phone has GPS and cellular connection in addition to being on my home network.

So, yes, I knew it was me because I was authenticating all those devices at that moment.

But, the location should not be so random every time considering that everything was on the same network with the same IP address. And, I would have expected that my iPhone would have the most accurate location given that it has the same home network, and a cellular connection, and a GPS. That's 3 points of reference for triangulation on the phone. Yet it was the least accurate location with two factor authentication.

Google maps always knows where my home network and my phone are. Likewise, when I trigger my gmail verification, it also pinpoints my exact location.

So, Apple does have some work to do. Otherwise, users become accustomed to approving logins out of their area, and two-factor becomes useless.

 

[wproct]

Mine consistently says that the location of the logon is about 80 miles away. I have been trying to figure out how to just discontinue the two stage verification altogether but haven't been able to figure out how to do it.

 

[IowaLynn]

It use to show I was 200 miles away, I thought maybe where my ISP had a hub, surely not me. But two different far apart location, one to west, theater south by 2xx miles.

Maybe 10.3 tightened it.

 

[OriginalAppleGuy]

I have been trying to figure out how to just discontinue the two stage verification

I wouldn't do that if I was you. No matter where it says you are, two step authentication is still a great thing to have.

 

[gtmac]

Same here.

 

[Mlrollin91]

I wouldn't say mine isn't incorrect per se, but its definitely not spot on. Mine is usually 5~ miles off.

 

[c14nhl]

Mines shows a different country, every time! It has to improve.

 

[Nermal]

Same here. It shows me as being a 3.5 hour drive away. Apple could really do better here. My iPhone has a GPS, it's often connected to my home Wi-Fi and it has all the diagnostic/feedback options turned on. Apple could easily maintain a database of where any given IP address "lives", but for some reason instead seems to use an unreliable third-party database.

 

[scottish]

This always annoys me when I use it. It says I'm 200 miles from where I am - this is when connected to wifi and mobile network.

 

[firewire9000]

Me too at about 500 miles away.

 

[bripab007]

Just an FYI about geolocation of IPs: it's a difficult task to keep a geolocation database up-to-date and accurate. The network equipment I've worked with updates its geo database every few days, and it's still often inaccurate. Go pick three different online geolocation lookup sites on the internet, and you'll probably get two different locations for a given IP.

 

[simon lefisch]

I wouldn't say mine isn't incorrect per se, but its definitely not spot on. Mine is usually 5~ miles off.

Mine used to be the same. Lately though it says I'm in Dallas, TX. I'm in CA

 

[bripab007]

And see Dallas, TX is a major ISP routing hub, so it's not surprising and IP might be incorrectly tagged with that location depending on the location of the lookup server.

 

[friednoodles]

The implementation of this is really bad. The location is essentially useless and results in two bad things:

1. For users who aren't familiar with the limitations of geo IP lookups, it's confusing/alarming to see login requests from unrelated locations (I've already had family members and friends ask me what to do because "someone in x location is trying to log in", and have had at least one case where they were rightly rejecting it because the location looked weird but didn't realise it was their other device!)

2. Once they do understand, it gets them into the habit of approving logins that might not necessarily be trustworthy

If Apple used the device's GPS location when possible, that would be much more useful (even though it would be prone to spoofing, that's no worse than using the IP address, since it's easy to spoof via VPN anyway and is in all cases less accurate than the device's actual GPS location).

 

[orbital~debris]

Has anyone submitted this via apple.com/feedback?

 

[dadiduekappa]

Has anyone submitted this via apple.com/feedback?

Already two times, they never replied. For me I live in Naples (Italy) but they show me in Milan (800km north)

 

[orbital~debris]

Already two times, they never replied. For me I live in Naples (Italy) but they show me in Milan (800km north)

They never reply in my experience. But, I have noticed that some of the things I've suggested appear in software sooner or later.

I'm hopeful that the more people report an issue, the more chance something will get done to resolve that issue.

 

[C DM]

Has anyone submitted this via apple.com/feedback?

Already two times, they never replied. For me I live in Naples (Italy) but they show me in Milan (800km north)

When it comes to actual issues it's usually better to submit a bug report (rather than just feedback) at http://bugreport.apple.com

 

[orbital~debris]

When it comes to actual issues it's usually better to submit a bug report (rather than just feedback) at http://bugreport.apple.com

Thanks for the tip, but when I tried to sign-in with my Apple ID I got the error message "account does not exist". So I can't do this.

 

[FeliApple]

Same here, mine is 235 km away.

 

[GreyOS]

When it comes to actual issues it's usually better to submit a bug report (rather than just feedback) at http://bugreport.apple.com

Why is it better? You can still flag feedback as a bug and give all the necessary info, logs and screenshots so it can be managed as a bug internally by Apple.