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Cisco To Acquire OpenDNS
New submitter Tokolosh writes: Both Cisco and OpenDNS announced today that the former is to acquire the latter. From the Cisco announcement: "To build on Cisco's advanced threat protection capabilities, we plan to continue to innovate a cloud delivered Security platform integrating OpenDNS' key capabilities to accelerate that work. Over time, we will look to unite our cloud-delivered solutions, enhancing Cisco's advanced threat protection capabilities across the full attack continuum—before, during and after an attack." With Cisco well-embedded with the US security apparatus (NSA, CIA, FBI, etc.) is it time to seek out alternatives to OpenDNS?
Malware domain filtering as well, don't forget that.
The best defense against virus and malware is blocking them before your computer can even connect to download.
Or be a better netizen by running your own and forwarding to your ISP's.
The whole reason OpenDNS even exists is because ISP's proved they cannot be trusted to run an honest DNS. And let's not pretend that DNSSEC is universally deployed.
Most people here can setup up a 99 cent VPS with an openvpn endpoint running a recursive resolver, limited to the openvpn net. That fits in the smallest slice of RAM available in 2015 and will work fine.
Most other people cannot, though. Google's DNS is honest, if you don't care about tracking - but most people care more about free stuff than privacy.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I've always used Level3, personally. Its anycast based, like Google's service.
Just pick 2 or more of the following:
4.2.2.1
4.2.2.2
4.2.2.3
4.2.2.4
4.2.2.5
4.2.2.6
It is even somehow faster than my ISP in terms of response time.
Or broken DNS is so pervasive that it is interfering with their ability to offer other services. If you're interested in the privacy policy around Google DNS it's available here. The quick TLDR is:
What information does Google log when I use the Google Public DNS service?
Google Public DNS complies with Google's main privacy policy, which you can view at our Privacy Center. With Google Public DNS, we collect IP address (only temporarily) and ISP and location information (in permanent logs) for the purpose of making our service faster, better and more secure. Specifically, we use this data to conduct debugging and to analyze abuse phenomena. After 24 hours, we erase any IP information. For more information, read the Google Public DNS privacy page.
Is any of the information collected stored with my Google account?
No.
Does Google share the information it collects from the Google Public DNS service with anyone outside Google?
No, except in the limited circumstances described in Google's privacy policy, such as legal processes and enforceable governmental requests. (See also Google's Transparency Report on user data requests.)
Does Google correlate or combine information from temporary or permanent logs with any personal information that I have provided Google for other services?
No.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Who here trust Cisco?
Your bank.
There are no loopholes. It's either legal or it's not.
A former colleague of mine left to a startup which some years later was absorbed by Google. The work she does at Google involves access to multiple Google databases (to detect fraudulent access patterns), which is apparently unusual. I asked her about the DNS database; she said that is the one database to which she (and most other projects at Google) doesn't have access. I took from this that Google does track DNS access.