Google Offers Public DNS Service
December 4th, 2009Update: Some Thoughts on Google DNS
Interesting post from the CEO of DNS services company OpenDNS, who probably feels the bull’s-eye painted on his chest:
Google claims that this service is better because it has no ads or redirection. But you have to remember they are also the largest advertising and redirection company on the Internet. To think that Google’s DNS service is for the benefit of the Internet would be naive. They know there is value in controlling more of your Internet experience and I would expect them to explore that fully…
…It’s not clear that Internet users really want Google to keep control over so much more of their Internet experience than they do already — from Chrome OS at the bottom of the stack to Google Search at the top, it is becoming an end-to-end infrastructure all run by Google, the largest advertising company in the world. I prefer a heterogeneous Internet with lots of parties collaborating to make this thing work as opposed to an Internet run by one big company.
—End Update—
Update: What if DNS on my ISP sucks?
Someone mentioned that this could be helpful for people who use an ISP with crappy DNS. Ok, so if you don’t want to change ISPs pick a nearby university (public or private) type its name into a search engine along with DNS. Click around for a few seconds and you’re likely to find the DNS server addresses. I’m not saying that all of them offer public DNS, but many of them do.
—End Update—
My only commentary would be: You’d have to be out of your f*&%$#@ mind to use this.
But here’s a more balanced view, if you want it.
Via: PCWorld:
Today’s news can prompt two very different views of Google, based on the announcement of its free Google Public DNS.
In one view, Google is our best friend and a noble public servant. In the other, Google may be the darkest force on the Internet. Which is it? We all must decide.
Here’s the news: Today Google has begun offering an experimental, but stable, Public Domain Name Server (DNS), described in a Thursday post to Google’s Official Blog.
The goal is for the new DNS to increase browsing speed and improve Internet security. I have read the technical description and believe it to the extent that I have already changed the DNS at my office to point to the new Google Public DNS. It is, however, too early to tell if my browsing has become faster.
…
The downside is that Google’s Public DNS will also give the Internet giant an unparalleled look what people are doing on the Internet. It will, for example, be able to log every DNS request made by every user of its system. If that doesn’t frighten you at least a little, it perhaps ought to.
While I generally trust Google, whose response to most paranoia is, “Why would we risk our whole business to do something as stupid as that?” I am aware that many others don’t trust the company and feel they have good reasons.
We also don’t know about “passive” uses for all the data Google collects. Things we are not aware of but wouldn’t like if we knew about them. I am not accusing, just making the case that Google’s activities require careful monitoring.
Do I believe Google tries to do the right thing? Yes, but I am also one of the few people who generally trusts Microsoft and always trusts Bill Gates. The paranoids say I am a fool.
I liked this from a slashdot post:
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/09/12/03/1814238/Google-Launches-Public-DNS-Resolver
“No magic, brilliance, or good will on Google’s part here – just horsepower and the willingness to operate at a financial loss in order to mine more data.”
@AHuxley
aye.
which brings the FCC/IP phone transition story to mind as well.
—
and
http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul
Hm. And our providers don’t log which site i am looking at? You are right with a university dns, but the majority just uses this 192.168.1.1…
Keep in mind that a userbase used to googledns can’t be fooled that easy into DPI or traffic redirecting. Sure, the ISP can give access only to 8.8.8.8 or 8.8.4.4, but then it will be easier to argue with politicians to get dns neutrality back (wishful thinking, i know) along the lines of “why can i access _only_ google-dns, that is a monopoly etcetc.