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This article focuses on DNS, there are many other critical parts of "control" of the Internet such as IP address allocation, root CAs, and infrastructure operat

by cle 4y ago

This article focuses on DNS, there are many other critical parts of "control" of the Internet such as IP address allocation, root CAs, and infrastructure operators. IMO DNS and CAs are relatively easy to bypass "authority" because you can still communicate with other hosts via IP routing; address allocation and infrastructure operators are where the real control is.

throwaway1777 4y ago
Sure, but 99.9% of people on the internet will use the search bar.
RobotToaster 4y ago
There are alternative DNS roots, so I guess that begs the question, would it be possible to create your own parallel IP address system, or equivalent?
- sybercecurity 4y ago
  Maybe, but it would take massive amounts of buy in and (likely) money. There are some protocol hooks that could make it possible, but the current set of systems are optimized for one address allocation. It would be prohibitively expensive to either have a parallel transit network, or reengineer routers to manage multiple, parallel routing tables. It's the social buy-in that the show stopper. There has been multiple DNS replacements, but none gained critical mass enough to get deployed on a large scale. It was never seen as worth the cost to migrate to a new naming system.
- alfons_foobar 4y ago
  Have you heard about IPv6? ;)
lapinot 4y ago
This article focuses on DNS and AS numbers. Which are very much related to actual data plane. (i believe OP only looks at AS of authoritative dns servers, but it's most likely a good first approximation of the actual size and behavior of ASs) > address allocation and infrastructure operators are where the real control is. Most of them are also dns operators (at least for themselves), which is why it's a good proxy to study the state of the internet. Also: in theory dns isn't that much needed (as you say, just use tcp/ip directly), but you'd be surprised what breaks when you blackhole dns packets on a network.

by cle 4y ago

throwaway1777 4y ago

Sure, but 99.9% of people on the internet will use the search bar.

RobotToaster 4y ago

There are alternative DNS roots, so I guess that begs the question, would it be possible to create your own parallel IP address system, or equivalent?

sybercecurity 4y ago
Maybe, but it would take massive amounts of buy in and (likely) money. There are some protocol hooks that could make it possible, but the current set of systems are optimized for one address allocation. It would be prohibitively expensive to either have a parallel transit network, or reengineer routers to manage multiple, parallel routing tables. It's the social buy-in that the show stopper. There has been multiple DNS replacements, but none gained critical mass enough to get deployed on a large scale. It was never seen as worth the cost to migrate to a new naming system.
alfons_foobar 4y ago
Have you heard about IPv6? ;)

lapinot 4y ago

This article focuses on DNS and AS numbers. Which are very much related to actual data plane. (i believe OP only looks at AS of authoritative dns servers, but it's most likely a good first approximation of the actual size and behavior of ASs) > address allocation and infrastructure operators are where the real control is. Most of them are also dns operators (at least for themselves), which is why it's a good proxy to study the state of the internet. Also: in theory dns isn't that much needed (as you say, just use tcp/ip directly), but you'd be surprised what breaks when you blackhole dns packets on a network.