CentralNic Enables uk.com Wildcard DNS

JamesS writes "It appears that CentralNic has enabled wildcard DNS matching. Many Slashdot readers will remember the backlash aimed at Verisign the last time it did this nearly two years ago to the day, introducing SiteFinder to the world at large."

Comments

Re:Non-issue

[norfolkboy]

.co.uk isn't a real TLD. it's a second level domain. .uk is a real TLD

It's their own private TLD, who cares?

[sexyrexy]

It's the same as me offering subdomains on my privately-held domain, but having a catchall as well. Why is this even an issue?

Is this such a big deal?

[Joel Rowbottom]

[Disclaimer: Vested interest]

I don't see why it's such a big deal for CentralNic to do it, really. UK.com is their domain for them to do with as they wish.

I worked for CentralNic day-to-day for a few years, and the company last enabled this in, er, 2000 I think. It lasted 3 days, during which we were subjected to a barrage of emails from people saying 'wah wah what have you done you've stolen my site' because they'd forgotten to put the 'co' in 'co.uk', and IE had attempted to be clever and autocomplete with '.com'.

I think the change now is probably because they're doing a bit more with portals, and it makes sense for them to increase the eyeball level by doing this.

But, er... doesn't seem such a big deal.

Re:Is this such a big deal?

[interiot]

The issue the Register brings up is that if the community accepts that it's okay for the largest non-TLD portions of DNS to be wildcarded, that it makes it that much easier for Verisign or other TLD's to justify wildcarding TLD's.

Yeah, it's a slippery-slope argument, and in 20 years, it might be possible that everyone agrees that TLD's can never do it, but 2nd-level domains are free to do it. But for now, since Verisign says they'll probably reactivate it, we should send a clear and simple message that it's bad practice in general.

Whatever

[Spazmania]

CentralNIC is a second-level domain owner. They can do whatever their customers will let them do with *.uk.com.

The outrage at Verisign was over their misappropriation of a root-level domain space where they were merely the custodian.

Re:TDLA wildcard

[fulldecent]

If you're using Firefox, you can type slashdot into the URL box... and by some magic, you will get to the correct site.
</whisper>

newsforimbeciles.slashdot.org

[Anonymous Coward]

Proof that slashdot has enabled whildcard DNS for slashdot.org. Slay the infidels.

Re:its just a subdomain

[nocomment]

ya even slashdot uses them. I really don't see what the problem is here.

Mostly a problem for email admins

[Anonymous Coward]

Wildcarding even subdomains become a problem for some email admins who do things like check that the from address is really an address that can be replied to. Until there are better checks in place making sure that foo@foobar5.uk.com is a really domain that can recieve mail is a problem with wildcarding.

raising storm in a glass of water

[nomad63]

I am sorry but if I own a domain, like myself.com, I have every right to do whatever I want with the third level subdomains unless I clearly declared somewhere in my terms of service that, I will abide and governed by the same rules that applies to tld dns providers like verisign.

typing fskjljg.com to your browser and typing fskjljg.myself.com are two different concepts. For the first one, no one claimed ownership by paying money and verisign in the recent past, decided, they can do anything they want. So they basically claimed rights to every unpublished domain name available.

Whereas uk.com in this example, claimed stake at this domain by paying anregistering this domain name. If you are hitting their server to access another and you have the wrong information, they can do whatever they wish, as you, the surfer, chose to visit a webserver (not a DNS server only) hosted by them.

I am not really thrilled how the two concepts put in the same category to ruffle feathers personally. Must be a slow news day at the register.

Re:Long live TLDs!

[RAMMS EIN]

Oh dog please no! There are several disadvantages to your proposal:

``They should be enforced''

By whom? By the trustworthy Verisign? By the trustworthy some other company? By the trustworthy some committee? By the trustworthy government of some country?

``in order to get a .com you should have to provide a business license, in order to get a .org you have to be a 503(c) or whatever, and in order to get a country code domain you have to actually be connected in that country.''

So this means that the application process for a TLD would be different for each country, because what counts as a business license? What is the local equivalent of 503(c)? What if a country doesn't have any such equivalent? What country TLDs are you allowed to use if you're based in one country, have your site hosted in another country, and have customers from several countries? Do you realize what kind of a monstrous bureaucracy you're asking for?

``Additionally, TLDs with no country code should be strictly limited to international or virtual organizations only.''

At what point does an organization become international enough? If there website gets visits from outside the country? If they have a customer from outside the country? If they have an office in another country? How many countries? Does my personal website (meant for anyone, anywhere, but I only live in one country) count as international?

``McDonalds could qualify for a .com, but the local burger joint would have to get a .com.us.''

And what happens when the local joint expands over the border? Do they get the right to a .com? Do they retain the right to their old TLD? Would you like your customers to suddenly have to memorize a different URI for your site when the status of your organization changes?

``Mozilla could still be mozilla.org because it only exists on the Net''

Or rather .net? Or both? Or some yet to be invented TLD for virtual vs. real organizations?

``Function TLDs other than com and org would work the same way, of course, although I don't know off the top of my head what the criteria for .net and such would be.''

And do you trust any individual or group to come up with criteria that are universally acceptible?

Re:Non-issue

[Andy_R]

It is an issue, my company gets a shitload of e-mail intended for the (bigger) company that bought the 'uk.com' version of our domain, because their customers (or more commonly their staff) 'correct' their address.

The whole purpose of uk.com is to mislead gullible people into thinking they are buying a real domain. I just wish someone would take it away from the scammers selling subdomains to the unwary and use it for a proper purpose.

remember uk.com isn't a real tld

[petermgreen]

its a short domain name someone happened to grab and sell names under.

as such afaict its basically unregulated and a fairly stupid place to put your site.