Static IP gone

[#1]

I have had a static IP for many years. Today my IP address has changed (don't know if it is a new static or not). I also noticed when checking my ip address that there was (briefly) an IPV6 address listed, although that has disappeared.

If there is a PN rep around please can I have my original IP address back?

[#2]

This is weird - my router is showing the correct WAN IP address but both my laptop and iphone are showing a different (and same) IP address. The iphone is also showing an IPV6 address I think. My VPN app (Surfshark) is turned off on both.

Have just checked wife's iphone, it too is showing the same rogue IP address and an IPV6 address. It does not have any vpn app at all installed

Some more digging:

Speed tests at the router are fine (805/104 Mbps) but at the wireless clients the ISP is now listed as BT and the speedtest shows 8/9 Mbps

Something seems to have gone very wrong

[#3]

OK last post before bedtime

It may be that this oddity only affects devices connected wirelessly to the router. They are all somehow picking up the same external IP address, which is not my static IP address. My only computer with a wired connection has the correct IP address and seemingly a full speed internet connection

Router is an ASUS RT-AX68U

Now I'm not sure which end the fault lies; and ideas gratefully received

[#4]

I know its the obvious one, but are you sure your wireless devices aren't connected to someone else's wifi ?

[#5]

Or (we’ve seen this before) connected to an Ethernet over power WAP … which has connected to a neighbouring Ethernet over power LAN?

[#6]

@Townman @MisterW 

Thanks for the replies.

Definitely not connected to someone else's wifi and I don't have any powerline WAPS. ( There are only 3 other wifi networks in range, and mine are obvious from the names).

I left everything off overnight, no change. Wireless devices are somehow getting the same spurious external IP address even though I can see them connected in the router stats page. It's as if they are being tunneled like a vpn. Another odd thing is that the external IP address they are picking up IS listed as a BT address local to me

I have now noticed that this problem affects mostly clients connected to the 5Ghz band (but not exclusively, my phone stubbornly refuses to pick up the correct address whichever band it is connected to)

I think the next step is probably a factory reset of the router, or even to dig out the PN router which is still in its box unwrapped

[#7]

@beeceegee  I see your router allows 2 seperate lan connections. Not knowing the router's history I suspect it could have become slightly confused. Best bet is a full factory reset..........

[#8]

@Champnet 

Thanks for the reply

Had router from new, only ever been on PN.

A long shot, but wondering if the ONT is involved somehow, finding it odd that the rogue IP address appears to be quite local to me. I'll reboot it and if that doesn't work reset the ASUS, and if that doesn't work swap in the PN router

[#9]

Hiya @beeceegee, 

Thanks for getting in touch, I can see any change on our side. 

Can you PM me what the IP address was before and what it is showing as now? 

[#10]

@SammyM 

Thanks for the reply

I'm now thinking that @MisterW was correct in thinking another local network is interfering, just not sure how. There are only a few networks nearby, all have BT labeled wireless. I always change my network names (to ancient Roman authors) to avoid confusion. Internal network has always been 192.18.1.xxx. On Sunday we  noticed many attached devices running slow. On investigation we discovered that all the devices were properly logged on to my wireless networks, however external IPs were being reported as an address within the BT IP pool. This seemed to affect mostly devices connecting on the 5Ghz band although a few others were intermittently affected, including wired devices. At all times the Asus router reported the correct WAN IP

So yesterday I substituted the PN router for my Asus. When the problem persisted I guessed that the other network must also be  using the 192.168.1.xx range so changed my range to 192.168.2.xxx and spent the rest of the day trying to reconfigure my devices (the dishwasher still steadfastly refuses to play nicely!)

I will have to reintroduce the Asus at some point, as the PN router wireless cannot make full use of a 900/100 connection. Things seem stable at the moment, just a couple of devices to reconnect.

If anyone has any theories about what happened......

I have PM'd the WAN addresses

[#11]

@beeceegee 

If your router was showing the correct WAN IP but some devices are showing a different public IP (via whatsmyip) , then those devices are not connected via your router!

How they ARE connected, well that's a different matter...

[#12]

Just plucking something out of the air.

Is one of you mobile devices creating a hot-spot and it is strong that your router wifi, therefore connects first. Or, are they connecting to the BT hot-spot wifi network, hence the BT address

[#13]

@MisterW 

Can't argue that  However I have just done an experiment with my one wired only computer. I had set it with a static ip address in the 192.168.2.xx range, which is the range set in the router. I changed the connection to dhcp, whereupon it acquired an address in the 192.168.1.xxx range. A check on whatsmyip showed the rogue BT IP address, and a quick dig around on 192.168.1.254 revealed what appears to be a BT hub at the other end. So how is that not connecting via my router?? It is also showing up in the list of connected devices in my router's Hub Manager.

This is getting quite scary

Brian

[#14]

@beeceegee  Does your router have an enabled guest network option ?

[#15]

@Champnet 

It's a PN Hub 2, pretty sure it doesn't have a guest network option