IP Addy from Google Review

Hi guys, I've offered to help out a friend who happens to own a company that has had several negative reviews on Google. It would appear that these reviews all emanate from the same person - a competitor. I've said I'd look into the possibility of tracing the review back to the individuals IP address to help him prove (or disprove) his theory of who is behind the negative reviews.

I know this can be done, however, I don't believe that it is a particularly easy task but a pointer in the right direction would be most appreciated.

Cheers,

4 Responses

Use social engineering to get that IP; should be easy too.

search for an image that you know it would entice the "Bad Reviewer" to be curious and to eventually click on it
copy the URL of the image
go to blasze.tk and follow the instructions
once blasze gives you a new URL, go to goo.gl (a URL shortener but since the bad review was on Google, use Google services) to obfuscate the blasze URL
go back to blasze and enter the "Tracking Code" to better understand how it works and to see your IP addy (and Google's), before the "Bad Reviewer" clicks on the bait (and he will)
paste the goo.gl URL somewhere the "Bad Reviewer would likely see it
wait
check back periodically on blasze with your Tracking Code and you should have his IP at some point. If the "Bad Reviewer" doesn't click on it within a week, start over and use a different image, something more enticing...

Although this method will work it will also entice many others to click on the image making this method basically useless

Make sure to correlate the image hits with newly-posted bad reviews.

Well, I disagree that the method describe will make it basically useless.

Google Reviews are done by users, so for example, "bad reviewer" is named John Doe.

You'll be targeting John Doe with the goo.gl link. You can post it on his G+ Account, Hangouts, Youtube or email (link to email is found on YT); basically wherever you think he'll click it. However, I would only do it on the profile as an email might look phishy and g Hangouts might raise suspicion, but they are last resorts.

Chances are John Doe will only have a very small number of Google friends, if any. Post something on his Google profile and it should draw him out. If you get several IP's, wait another week and do it again and again the week after. Do something similar on the real competitors FB page with a different goo.gl Image, then start comparing IP addresses.

Since it doesn't matter per-se if it takes 1 week or 4 weeks, I'd take my time and set the trap slowly.

The only foreseeable problem is if he never clicks on the link or if he used an account once and never looked back; then you'd have to search for other similar businesses to see if they have similar bad reviews and see if the "Bad reviewer" is the same or someone else, and start over with new goo.gl links.

and be patient.

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