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back to article Verisign opens up its DNS

Verisign is throwing its hat into the “free DNS” ring, promising not to retain information about recursive requests to its just-launched service. Verisign Public DNS is at 64.6.64.6 / 64.6.65.6, alas nowhere near as easy for people to remember as Google's 8.8.8.8 / 8.8.4.4. In the blog post launching the service, the director …

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  1. Your alien overlord - fear me

    t's and c's to stop Verisign's own customers being Veri rude. As for the 'no harvesting', whose taking bets before that is quietly slipped into the agreement that even your organs will be harvested?

    2 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Pirate

      "whose taking bets before that is quietly slipped into the agreement that even your organs will be harvested"

      You don't have to use them or Google or anyone else's. Simply install your own and get it to start at root hints. Compared to the other metrics and data available from your browser, DNS lookups are pretty poor fare (what are you actually doing on that Register place that I gave you the address for?)

      1 0 Reply
    2. g e
      Reply Icon

      Advertising?

      Wasn't it Verisign that redirected unresolved lookups or something to adverts some years ago?

      0 0 Reply
      1. Anonymous Coward
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        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Advertising?

        That was OpenDNS.

        0 0 Reply
  2. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    For the really advanced users ...

    We have another set of highly available IPs to ping for WAN availability. Addresses like 8.8.8.8 and 64.6.64.6 are not single devices or systems and hence are really good targets for "is this internet connection really working".

    Normally the wife (other partner choices are available) will inform you in no uncertain terms whether the internet (OK: cat piccy repository) is available. For routers without that grade of monitoring, these addresses are invaluable for multi-link connections to t'tubes. You ping a different one down each connection to confirm if it is really working and not simply connected to your ISP(s).

    1 1 Reply
  3. Mike 16

    Seeing as it's Verisign,

    I would have thought 66.6.66.6 would be more appropriate.

    I'm sure they could come to an arrangement with cttel.net

    "Nice little hosting business you have here. Shame if anything were to happen to it"

    5 0 Reply
  4. oneeye

    Those anti disparaging agreements are illegal here in the US. The FTC is currently dealing with a shady diet fad company who was threatening law suits against former customers who were writing bad reviews of them,which they deserved. Now,because of that,the scummy ripoff artist is in a WHOLE lot more trouble!

    2 0 Reply
    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge
      Reply Icon

      "Those anti disparaging agreements are illegal here in the US."

      Same here in the UK, but better yet, they are completely irrelevant since most people will "discover" the addresses from many sources across the internet with reference to any T&C and they can't make you read the T&Cs before using their DNS service.

      I remember someone telling me about Googles 8.8.8.8 some years ago when my ISP was having some DNS issues so I switched my secondary to Google instead of the ISP. Everything went back to normal with most DNS request going to my ISP but I never saw or agreed to any T&Cs for Google.

      0 0 Reply
  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    OpenDNS

    I trust Verisign about as much as I trust Google, which is about as far as I could spit a large rat. I'll stick to OpenDNS. Until someone reveals that they're harvesting personal info as well...

    0 0 Reply
    1. Alan Bourke
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      Re: OpenDNS

      Plus the inexpensive paid OpenDNS service has useful content filtering abilities as well.

      1 0 Reply
    2. Dan 55 Silver badge
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      Re: OpenDNS

      OpenDNS now belongs to Cisco, so I wouldn't get your hopes up.

      0 0 Reply
    3. mawhrin-skel
      Reply Icon

      Re: OpenDNS

      Unlike OpenDNS, OpenNIC lives up to the spirit of openness: https://www.opennicproject.org/

      0 0 Reply
  6. John Robson Silver badge

    2620:74:1b::1:1 / 2620:74:1c::2:2

    Hmm - this is another reason IPv6 is a PITA - configuring DNS servers in the first place...

    At least the addresses are reasonably abbreviated, but 8.8.8.8 is far easier to remember, and type

    0 0 Reply
  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Certificate

    I went to https://publicdnsforum.verisign.com/discussion/5/verisign-public-dns-terms-of-service and up popped the browser warning about a bad certificate, only valid for vanillacommunity.com

    Can you run this "Verisign is a Global Leader in Domain Names & Internet Security" thing past me again.

    4 0 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Certificate

      I'm pretty sure that's a problem at your end, and you're suffering a MITM attack.

      0 0 Reply

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