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Anonymizing IP

Managing IP Address Collection in Dreamdata​

Dreamdata's script captures the IP addresses of your site visitors to enhance data insights. However, we understand the need for privacy and offer the option to anonymize IP addresses. This document details the use of IP addresses in Dreamdata and guides you on how to anonymize them if preferred.

Why Does Dreamdata Collect IP Addresses?​

Dreamdata utilizes IP addresses for:

  1. Geolocation: Determining the visitor's country based on their IP address, enriching the context of the activity data.
  2. Company Identification: Associating anonymous traffic with companies, when the IP address is linked to a business, aiding in understanding visitor demographics.

What Are the Implications of Anonymizing IP Addresses?​

Opting to anonymize IP addresses means:

  • Geolocation Limitations: Dreamdata won’t be able to attribute visitor activity to specific countries.
  • Company Association: The ability to link anonymous traffic to specific companies via IP lookup will be unavailable.
  • Unaffected Functionality: All other Dreamdata features remain operational, ensuring comprehensive analytics without IP-based insights.

How to Anonymize IP Addresses​

To anonymize all IPs, you can enable the anonymizeIPs property when loading your analytics.

analytics.load('<DREAMDATA_API_KEY>', {
  anonymizeIPs: true,
});

Alternatively, it is possible to adjust the individual tracking calls by setting the IP address to '0.0.0.0' within the context object. Apply this modification to every relevant Dreamdata SDK call:

// For Page Views
analytics.page({}, { context: { ip: '0.0.0.0' } });

// For Tracking Events
dreamdata.track('conversion', {}, { context: { ip: '0.0.0.0' } });

// For Identifying Users
dreamdata.identify(
  null,
  { email: 'person@email.com' },
  { context: { ip: '0.0.0.0' } }
);

This change needs to be consistent across all track, page, and identify calls to fully anonymize IP data. Omitting this adjustment defaults to standard IP collection practices.