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ICANN Asks VeriSign To Stop DNS Wildcarding
MrClever writes "In this article over at the Sydney Morning Herald (AU), it looks as though ICANN may actually be doing something about the VeriSign changes to .com and .net TLD's. Apparently, while they have been noticably quiet, they have been reviewing community reaction and analysed data from a technical perspective. Here's hoping ICANN pull the plug on VeriSign's TLD administration rights!" And TALlama writes "RSS.com.com (dear $DIETY, will it ever stop?) is reporting that ICANN has asked VeriSign 'to voluntarily suspend the service' of wildcarding DNS, 'pending further study.' Calling it a 'service' is a little bit of a misnomer. If I punch people in the face, can I call that a service, too?"
For starters, sitefinder doesn't find the slashdot site!
It isn't nearly as helpful or reliable as google (even if google is censored a bit).
It causes me to download more stuff than I would if they didn't have the diversion abusing my bandwith and data allowances that I have to pay for.
I can turn the msn search in IE off. I turned the sitefinder.verisign.com off by modifying my hosts file but that isn't easy for most of the customers I support.
-- it must be true, it's on the internet.
Honestly I don't think VeriSign will stop this "service" because of public pressure alone. I used to have my domains registered at VeriSign but I was tired of never being able to get a password for the web administrative interface.
VeriSign is a great service if you're not planning on making any changes to your domain information. A few years ago I needed to update my name. VeriSign "offered" (the free version was in small print and out of the way) the service to have my name change rushed for over $100.
I suspect ICANN is stepping in due to public pressure, not VeriSign.
If we all add this command:
;p
iptables -I INPUT -j REJECT 69.94.0.0/15
maybe that will get Verisign's attention
Afterall theres nothing they can do about people blackholing them for a good long while until they say they are sorry. As a penalty they should lower the prices of their domain registration, to something competitive.
Well if more companies behaved like this maybe the world would be a better place (well not for lawyers admittedly).
/. write "why didn't they just ask x to stop y". Well now somebody has.
I've lost count the number of times i've seen people in
What if SCO just asked for its code not to be used instead of sending the lawyers in?
Or Apple records asked Apple computers to stop selling music?
etc...
Of course you can sell your Punch in the Face services. Such services have traditionally gone under names such as
Now, this analogy actually does continue. You, as a sysadmin or someone writing a script that uses DNS, might not really like this service. Just like someone who is trying to take celebrity photographs might not like the Punch-in-the-Face service. But the fact is that this service is provided. And that there are a LOT of people who not only don't see this as a problem - but like it. Or at least think they do.
That is why Verisign thinks they can get away with this - the average person sees a benefit here and sees no drawbacks. The average person watching a boxing match also just sees the benefits and not the drawbacks. Until it is made clear why this isn't as good as it appears, nobody will care. Chances are, nobody will care anyway.
...and hang tough.
After all, the IAB says here that "We must emphasize that, technically, this was a legitimate use of wildcard records that did not in any way violate the DNS specifications themselves."
If the decision-makers at Verisign cared about good engineering practice, they wouldn't have done what they did.
They probably regard their own actions as just "sharp business practice" and are probably patting themselves on the back for having found a loophole in the DNS specification that they can use for their own profit.
I don't think jawboning from ICANN, the IAB, or anyone else will have much effect. I don't see how anyone short of the Feds can stop them.
I mean, they have contracts with their SiteFinder advertisers. There's money at stake here.
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