Where does your device say you are "Located" on the ship's WIFI?

[HLR]

Does Carnival have GPS/location signals for Guest WIFI true to their location when at sea? I don’t mean for the ship’s guidance and radar, but for their WIFI network for the passengers.

 

On my last sailing on the MSC Meraviglia from NYC to Canada, when at sea, my “Location” was appearing as “Such-and-such, Germany”. Of course, when in port and off the ship’s WIFI the location was true to where we were on my Verizon network. I asked one of the ship’s crew and she replied that all the crew all appeared as being in Germany as well.

 

Is this typical of all cruise lines because they are not registered in the US or Canada?

 

Is there a way to set your actual location which is on the ship in the ocean? Let’s say I log into an app to contact my mother…it will say she’s in Berlin, Germany…when I know darn well she is in the lounge playing bingo!

HLR

Edited July 9, 2021 by HLR

[sanger727]

just curious why it matters?

[kwokpot]

I had this discussion in the Celebrity forum a couple of days ago when there was a question about downloading movies from Netflix while on the ships satellite wifi. MY experience with Carnival, Royal, Celebrity,and NCL is that it's all the same; it never shows the true gps location but instead it bounces the signal around. It's wild to see that my phone puts me on a ship in Russia in one moment then in Manhattan the next moment even though I'm in Florida.

When these situations happen there's no way to download movies from Netflix because of regional restrictions unless it puts us in an American location.

I'm glad someone else notices this! 

Edited July 9, 2021 by kwokpot

[crewsweeper]

Tech savvy folks may chime in but I would assume the location depends on the satellite system being used for satellite at sea.  But you should be in airplane mode on board to prevent roaming chanrges so that too can cause a default location. There may also be a default since ship movements.  In ports your cell service will pick up from their cellular network. 

[kwokpot]

Just now, crewsweeper said:

Tech savvy folks may chime in but I would assume the location depends on the satellite system being used for satellite at sea.  But you should be in airplane mode on board to prevent roaming chanrges so that too can cause a default location. There may also be a default since ship movements.  In ports your cell service will pick up from their cellular network. 

GPS still works when you're in airplane mode

[BlerkOne]

There are no cell towers at sea.

[klfrodo]

Your" location" on wifi is going to be based on the "server" that is connecting you to the internet world.

Therefore, the ships satellite service is being routed from your phone to the ships server,, up to a series of satellites, down to a ground based server (In this instance Germany), and then to the "internet".

 

I'm in Seattle, but with a VPN, my location can be set to anywhere in the world. Some Netflix shows can't be viewed in the US but if I set my location in Canada, I can watch the show. A few months ago I needed to connect to a .wa.gov site but could not connect because I was in Mexico at the time. Changed my location to the US via VPN,,,, and viola,,, connected.

 

 

[HLR]

Thanks Everyone! I liked Blerkone's response about the lack of cell towers so of course...no location station! 

[HLR]

43 minutes ago, klfrodo said:

Your" location" on wifi is going to be based on the "server" that is connecting you to the internet world.

Therefore, the ships satellite service is being routed from your phone to the ships server,, up to a series of satellites, down to a ground based server (In this instance Germany), and then to the "internet".

 

I'm in Seattle, but with a VPN, my location can be set to anywhere in the world. Some Netflix shows can't be viewed in the US but if I set my location in Canada, I can watch the show. A few months ago I needed to connect to a .wa.gov site but could not connect because I was in Mexico at the time. Changed my location to the US via VPN,,,, and viola,,, connected.

 

 

And I think I know Exactly Why you needed to look like you were in the US! I may have the same predicament soon!

[BlerkOne]

Carnival doesn't support use of VPN software, but a number of them work.

[AHS123]

1 hour ago, klfrodo said:

and viola,,, connected.

 

 

Do you really play the viola? 😉 

[kwokpot]

1 hour ago, klfrodo said:

Your" location" on wifi is going to be based on the "server" that is connecting you to the internet world.

Therefore, the ships satellite service is being routed from your phone to the ships server,, up to a series of satellites, down to a ground based server (In this instance Germany), and then to the "internet".

I understand that but I'm puzzled why the ground based server is always a ship in a port. My experience always is the mobile GPS doesn't list me in Hamburg city center somewhere,for example,but on a ship docked in the port of Hamburg,or St. Petersburg,or Manhattan.  I've never had it located me in an office building downtown.

[mpacker]

3 hours ago, crewsweeper said:

Tech savvy folks may chime in but I would assume the location depends on the satellite system being used for satellite at sea.  But you should be in airplane mode on board to prevent roaming chanrges so that too can cause a default location. There may also be a default since ship movements.  In ports your cell service will pick up from their cellular network. 

Doesn’t matter which satellite, but where the satellite is “beaming” info too.  That’s where you are connecting to internet from from their wifi network.   
 

as someone else said you GPS will work and find my friends on apple always reports correct GPS location to my friends (assuming im on wifi)

[babygrljaz]

My pictures have always showed the correct (or approximate) location when i'm onboard.   I didn't look at all of them obviously but there were several that i looked at the details for the time it was taken, which was way off, but the location did show somewhere in the Gulf.  Whether it was exactly if i dig deep into the coordinates i don't know but it seemed pretty close

[JohnMI]

To clarify, the GPS in your phone has nothing to do with the location a web site or service detects you as being from.  As explained above, it has to do with whatever ground-based provider is connecting the satellite internet connection to the ships.  So, everything will appear to be from that ground-based internet provider to Netflix or any other site that you are on.  But, again, that has absolutely nothing to do with what your phone determines is your location using GPS.