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U.S. Endorses ENUM
esarjeant writes "It looks like the the U.S. has endorsed ENUM (also known as E.164.arpa). This means you get a single number for phone and Internet, look for demos at Spring VON (San Jose, April 1-3) and VISIONng will be engaging in US trials. Essentially this means you get a new TLD of e164.arpa with your phone number in front of it." The addresses look pretty long and unwieldy, but supposedly consumer devices will make it easier to use.
From http://www.networkmagazine.com/article/printableAr ticle?doc_id=NMG20020304S0011:
.arpa domain."
"Just how does ENUM turn phone numbers into domains? When an ENUM client queries DNS, it reverses the phone number ordering and applies the domain name at the end. If the original number is +1-415-947-6022, for example, the ENUM client removes all the dashes and punctuation to get 14159476022. The phone number is then sent to DNS as 2.2.0.6.7.4.9.5.1.4.1.e.164.arpa, assuming the server is located in the
Used to be the case in the UK. The UK's primary network system was JANET (Joint Academic NETwork), and its systems worked as you described.
For example, I used to go to University in Lancaster. My email address was csc345@uk.ac.lancs.cent1. To communicate with the rest of the world however, I learnt to always write this as csc345@cent1.lancs.ac.uk.
Cheers,
Ian
ENUM in the News
EFA expresses security concerns over ENUM, SMH, November 27, 2002.
Enum's potential applications aren't as widespread as promised, New Architect, July 2002.
Internet Telephone Numbering System (ENUM) offers promise of a single point of contact for all communication devices, ITU Press Release, May 31, 2002.
Listing Again, The Economist, April 11, 2002.
Phone number-to-e-mail service raises privacy concerns, Computerworld, October 5, 2001.
Your Rights Online: A Number For Everything, Slashdot, September 4, 2001.
One number & and no escape anywhere, The Times, September 3, 2001.
This is actually a very important move to pry the phone system out of the clutches of the regional monopolies. They had wanted to use the phone number allocation process to control VoIP adoption, but ENUM sidesteps that. See the following recent stories:
: //biz.yahoo.com/bw/030210/102182_1.html
http://news.com.com/2100-1033-982130.html
http
Please read the usage scenarios in this Internet Draft if you don't know what ENUM is about.
> Doesn't this make it all that much easier to track
> people down?
Not at all.
Does the DNS system we've had all this time make it easier to track you down if someone had your IP address? Not at all.
Besides, if i wanted to wardial now, there is nothing to stop me.
Do you think its OK i dial all phone numbers on a telephone and write down who answers, but not to use a DNS database to see who has a domain linked to their phone number?
The latter would be less annoying atleast, i dont have to have you answer the phone disturbing you to know the number is active.
Right now IP addresses resolve back to hosts.
This isnt www.domain.com -> 192.168.0.1.
This is the other direction.
192.168.0.1 resolves to www.mydomain.com
This allows 555-1212 to resolve to phone.mydomain.com
That is all.
If you have 192.168.0.1, then you also get
1.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa to use to point to a host/domain. (For real IPs that is)
This allows your phone number to point back to a host/domain (IE phone.mydomain.com) as well.
You still have to know one of the two before hand.
The only possible info you can gain is that a phone number DOES or DOES NOT resolve at all.
If it does, you can assume that number is valid/active.
Right now the only method to do that is... lets see.. I can call it and see if someone answers. I can look it up in a digital phonebook (Technically the real phone book too, but it is not sorted in an easy way to do that kinda search) or just call up and ask the phone company if that number is available, you want it on your line.
And since this is reverse dns, it has to be setup.
A phone number could very well be active and if you dont wanna give it a domain, dont!
I dont have to have my IP resolve back to www.mydomain.com if i dont want it to. (Ok there are some technical reasons like SSL and SSH need this, as well as IRC etc, but those are rare.)
Just like you dont have to put it in the phone book (Well, ideally heh)
You can have an IP address and hand that out all over the place, just like you can only hand out your phone number.
DNS was made to make remembering IPs not needed.
Now they want to do the same thing with phone numbers, and all people do is bitch.
Hope this clears up some stuff.