My son has had his XBOX360 now for 6months, recently got him call of duty 3. Now its taking a long time to log into the live sessions of the game. Have figured out why. Its because the NAT settings on the xbox are set to "strict" they need to be on "open, now have found all the info I need to amend this. But I need a static ip address.So not keen on messing with the router settings as things are working fine now, but also is there any reason from a security point of view in having a static ip address? Have any of you done this routine and did it go smoothly? thanks in advance fellas.

Hello Sbowler,

I used to have a static IP address. It definitely makes things simple when you host websites/ftp sites/dedicated game servers/etc. But unless you are doing stuff like that, there is no real reason to have a static address.

From a security standpoint, it does make it easier for people to mess with you when they know your connection isn't secure and they have your IP address that never changes. I don't know much about hacking and such, but I would think having a dynamic address would be safer from that perspective.

But if you have a good internet security program with good virus/spyware protection and you surf the web safely, you shouldn't have any problems.

I would say, if you have your network secured and in working order, unless you need a static IP for a specific reason, I'd just leave it as is.

If you do get a static IP address, it really isn't difficult at all to set up. Once you set it up once, you are done with it for good. Until your address changes anyway

Hope that helps!

Hi sbowler,

If your talking about assigning a static IP address within your own network (which is what I suspect your trying to do), such as the xbox, then there are absolutely no security implications at all, since your internal IP addresses cannot be seen by the outside world.

If your talking about getting your ISP to assign you a static internet IP address, then this is where the benefits and security risks need to be weighed. There are obviously enourmous benifits of having a static internet IP address, but the only downfall is that hackers, once they have your IP address, they can continue attacking the same address.

EDIT: Sorry Wadd, didn't realise you already posted.

Marked as answered.