IP address

An IP address is a number assigned to each system that is participating in a network using the Internet Protocol, such as the World Wide Web.

There are two standards in use: IPv4 and IPv6, but every computer that has an IP address has at least an IPv4 address. An IPv4 address consist of 4 elements each ranging from 0 to 255. A well-known example is the IP-address 127.0.0.1, which points back at the computer that sends the query.