Id security in chat rooms...

Hi, this may seem like an inane question but I would like to know how secure one's Id and info are in chat rooms. I am extremely careful not give out any information and in fact even my registration info for my accounts in chat rooms is not accurate. However, I have noticed that once a person in a chat room asked me how I was doing in the country I reside in at present, although this is not the country I had used in filling out my form, nor had I mentioned it at any time in the chat room...and the other strange thing that happened was someone else in another chat room at another time said Hi to me using a name that appears in a separate account with completely different details. So, for example, although I was in the chat room under one account under the name of Jade, this person addressed me as Jolie, a name I use in another account. How could they have known? :confused: Can anyone help me with advice on this. I use all the basic knowledge I have on security but I found those two incidents unnerving...
I'd really appreciate some tips or background knowledge on this.
Thanks.
Pisces.

Finding the country you are in is relatively easy. If you know a person's IP you can lookup where this IP is located. This will give you a good enough estimate.
Sometimes it's also possible to find the person's local time (on irc /ctcp nick time). Then you'll know the timezone. This will also give you a general idea about the location.

Since both nicks come from the same IP it's usually safe to assume they're the same person (this doesn't have to be true if you use NAT).

Elementary, my dear Watson ;)

Getting your ip would also let them know that you were using to different names on 2 different chat rooms coz yhe 2 ips would be the same

cytex, as sirdice allready said.. that is not nescesarily true..

a local cybercafe i regularly visit has just one (1) IP adress for all it's customers (max 12)..
so they'd all be the same person, I think not..

how do they do that: simple.. a router (tux box with iptables) with Network Adress Translation..

other recent thread about nat

Sorry Jinx your right but if the person was in one chat room and got pices ip address and then seen it in another chat room and called pices by the same name as the first chat room this is how he could have made that asumption . I was only trying to think how they would have known this sorry :(

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and the other strange thing that happened was someone else in another chat room at another time said Hi to me using a name that appears in a separate account with completely different details. So, for example, although I was in the chat room under one account under the name of Jade, this person addressed me as Jolie, a name I use in another account. How could they have known?

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They can make some general assumptions on you based on your ip address (that may or may not be a dhcp address or a box behind nat or a proxy), as well as the host mask generated by that ip (names of boxes and domains that your communication originates from....you see it alot in irc, etc).

If they recognize these they may assume it is you, sometimes this might even give away the country you come from (such as a person in australia having a host mask with a .au at the end).

Another way to realise it is you under a different name is you slipping up in your story, or your 'speaking style'. Many people have a default way of speaking in chat rooms or certain quirks that give them away no matter how hard they try to hide.

The information you give out to sign up for these rooms is only as secure as the companies who take it. Some will hide it all away, others might let it be browsed by anyone. At the very least every time you connect you might be giving out your ip address, host mask (which may reveal isp information, country of origin, part of the country you live in, etc), possibly the account you logged into your own computer with, etc. It all depends on your setup and the type of chat you are using.