[joveian]

Searching for the file name the default database seems to be MaxMind's free database:

https://dev.maxmind.com/geoip/geolite2-free-geolocation-data

They are the comany that infamously set the default US location to a farm in Kansas, causing all sorts of trouble for the people who live there. From the file name it sounds like classify-client is by default only trying to identify the country you are in.

I'm not seeing a browser.search.geoip.url setting, however I have geo.enabled set to false and various other setting that might cause that to not be present.

[pests]

Default, or center?

[joveian]

I can't remember the details but there was at least one larger HN thread on it so it should be easy to find. Enough people (including various police agencies) were confused that it caused major issues for the people who lived there.

[pests]

I don't think they purposefully picked their farm though as the default, but rather their farm landed on the center of the polygon they were using to represent the area being searched. Maybe we need to figure out a different UI way of doing this, but isn't this unavoidable? Search any country on any maps app and zoom in to the max - you will be on someone's property.

[joveian]

I don't think it is worth going over this again here, as I said there was a HN thread with more info including your question discussed at some length. It sounds like they moved it to a lake to limit the chance of it happening again.

[pests]

I know exactly the thread you are talking about.

So they did choose a location - the lake, in response to the center being a bad location.