Discrepancy between IP addresses

[BoyJames]

Hi. Just started using Tunnelblick for Mac OS X and using VPNBOOK as my VPN service provider. I'm curious about something:

Why do the diagnostic logs show this:

*Tunnelblick: This computer's apparent public IP address changed from 172.56.22.71 before connection to 198.7.62.204 after connection

when my system preferences say that my IP address is this:

Wi-Fi is connected to Gertrude and has the IP address 172.20.10.2.

(Gertrude is the name of my iPhone, I'm connecting my desktop to my personal hotspot on my iPhone using T-mobile)

There is something in the details prior to the change of the IP address just preceding the connection which says this:

Changed DNS ServerAddresses setting from '172.20.10.1' to '207.244.82.25 108.59.15.5'

And that IP address (in bold) matches the address my system preferences say is the IP address I currently have. But the one they say it changed to, I have no idea what that is. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

[novaflash]

This is not the support forum for VPNBook.

172.20.10.2 falls within a private RFC1918 range.
172.56.22.71 is a public address. Probably yours.
198.7.62.204 is a public address too. Probably the VPN server's.


Connecting to a VPN server that redirects your Internet does not mean it changes the IP address on your network interface. It redirects your computer's Internet traffic through the VPN server and it goes through NAT (Network Address Translation) making it seem like the traffic from your computer going to the Internet, looks like it is coming from the VPN server itself. Replies are translated back. This is how VPN with Internet redirection works.

Your VPN interface has a private IP to communicate with the VPN server, and the VPN server has a public IP that it uses to communicate with the Internet.

So the behavior you see is exactly as expected.