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Earthlink Confirms DNS Redirects
Links to 'ISP geek' discussion in our forums

Last week we mentioned that Earthlink had quietly started redirecting failed DNS queries. A user alerts us that Earthlink has admitted to the change via their blog. It's a quick way for an ISP to make a buck off of your tangled fingers. When DSLExtreme was acquired by Ikano Communications, the new ownership tried something similar, but was forced to back off after ample customer complaints.

According to Earthlink, if a misspelled domain is not owned by anyone, or no longer exists, you'll be redirected to Earthlink's search page. The page directs users to "Please try the related content suggestions and paid advertisements below, or try another search."

"ISP geeks who track of this sort of thing noticed pretty quickly," notes the Earthlink blog, which links to an ongoing conversation in our forums. The entry then clarifies precisely what the service, which was developed in cooperation with BareFruit, is doing:

"It’s important to remember that the Barefruit system only processes errors classified as NXDOMAIN (non-existent domain) when they are in route back to a user’s browser, which means the user experience we are changing is a browser error stating the web site cannot be found or the auto-search functionality of Internet Explorer, neither of which are especially helpful to the user. The system is specifically configured to handle only NXDOMAIN HTTP traffic as it is being returned to the user’s browser and to not impact email and other non-web-browsing traffic."
As our "ISP geek" users note however, this does leave some potential to muck up the functionality of a significant number of network security and anti-spam applications. Most experienced web-users would prefer their ISP leave DNS functionality completely alone. Users here discuss how to change your DNS settings if the new feature annoys you.

In the blog comment section, the Earthlink project manager in charge of the initiative (Ken Womack) states that if "the system ends up negatively impacting users through unintended consequences, that wouldn't be good for EarthLink or our users. In that event, we can simply turn the functionality off."
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firewire9999
join:2004-07-11
Livonia, MI

firewire9999

Member

Glad I kicked there service to the curb

Just seems like earthlink is going down the tubes.

Dumped there service last week because of issues I was having with them for the past month. There service was good for a long time. Had DSL setup with them for close to four years with no major issues.

RadioDoc

join:2000-05-11
La Grange, IL

1 recommendation

RadioDoc

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

Dear Ken Womack:

Please report to your supervisor(s) that you have just cost the company over $1,000 a year in Internet access and webhosting fees. Now that I have pried my domain from your company's incompetent hands, it will be moving to greener pastures after 11 years of steadily declining service.

Thank you.

ps: Are you people nuts?

DrTCP
Yours truly

join:1999-11-09
Round Rock, TX

DrTCP

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

Being an Earthlink customer at home, I took the time to let the company know my position on DNS redirects and if this sort of things continue I might not be a customer for long.

If more Earthlink customers provide comments they might back off this ill advised experiment or if not they will lose some more loyal customers.
poolek
join:2003-11-04
Austin, TX

poolek to firewire9999

Member

to firewire9999
What's the big deal? It takes all of 5 seconds to change your router to use a different DNS if the search page offends you. It took me longer to type this message than make the change.

RadioDoc

join:2000-05-11
La Grange, IL

1 recommendation

RadioDoc

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

You clearly have no clue how DNS operates or what it's purpose is.

Since you seem to be a VoIP fan, here's an analogy:

You dial a number. You fat-finger one of the digits or dial one too many. Your VoIP provider, instead of giving you the normal 'no such number' intercept message plays a 15 second ad.

How would that work for you?
poolek
join:2003-11-04
Austin, TX

poolek

Member

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

I understand exactly how DNS works. I also know that I can change the default DNS to point to a provider other than Earthlink and avoid the ads altogether if I want.

DrTCP
Yours truly

join:1999-11-09
Round Rock, TX

DrTCP

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

said by poolek:

I understand exactly how DNS works. I also know that I can change the default DNS to point to a provider other than Earthlink and avoid the ads altogether if I want.
Why should you be forced to use another ISP DNS server or rather why another ISP should provide bandwidth and server resources for customers of Earthlink?

Also another ISP DNS will introduce probably have more latency for name resolutions.

You are paying Earthlink to a normally functioning DNS service as well and it is normal to demand the service you deserve.

LinuxJunkie
join:2005-01-19
Cyberspace

LinuxJunkie

Member

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

Here's a novel idea: why not just IGNORE the ads and re-type the damn domain name in?

DrTCP
Yours truly

join:1999-11-09
Round Rock, TX

DrTCP

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

said by LinuxJunkie:

Here's a novel idea: why not just IGNORE the ads and re-type the damn domain name in?
How is the automated spam filter that checks the DNS for invalid domains do that? Heck it does not even see that page as DNS does not use http protocol. How do you fix the DNS search order issue or VPN issues apparening after this change. More stuff breaks when you mess with DNS.

Internet is not just web and it is not limited to simply placing ads on error pages of the browser (which may be acceptable that should they have done it via an add-on plug-in to the web browser only)

RadioDoc

join:2000-05-11
La Grange, IL

RadioDoc to poolek

to poolek
said by poolek:

I understand exactly how DNS works. I also know that I can change the default DNS to point to a provider other than Earthlink and avoid the ads altogether if I want.
That statement shows how much you don't know. I'm sure whoever you are freeloading off of now is mighty glad to have you.

Thanks for avoiding the question though. You proved my point.
poolek
join:2003-11-04
Austin, TX

poolek

Member

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

I use Level3's DNS, which actually resolves faster than the default earthlink/mindspring one. Earthlink DSL may be different, but for Earthlink Cable over Time Warner lines in my area, the default DNS isn't that quick.

And it's no more 'freeloading' than viewing this site, which also happens to come over a portion of various provder's infrastructure to get to me. That's the nature of the internet.

While I agree I'd rather see Earthlink not do this, I don't understand complaining about something when there's such an easy resolution to the problem. If the redirect offends you, change your DNS. Problem solved.

DrTCP
Yours truly

join:1999-11-09
Round Rock, TX

1 edit

DrTCP

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

said by poolek:

While I agree I'd rather see Earthlink not do this, I don't understand complaining about something when there's such an easy resolution to the problem. If the redirect offends you, change your DNS. Problem solved.
I agree. The Earthlink cable DNS servers on Time Warner cable has more latency than some other DNS servers you could use. Typically this is not true.

Free loading or not you are actually paying for Earthlink. The thing that I do not understand about you is that you are accepting this and not requesting the service you deserve.

If you do not react to this pretty soon all ISPs will be doing something similar. Your normal DNS server choices will be less and less.

Edit: spelling
poolek
join:2003-11-04
Austin, TX

poolek

Member

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

You've got a good point. I'll drop Earthlink a note and tell them that if they are going to do something like this, it should be an 'opt in' type deal. Maybe even give a cheaper monthly rate for folks who choose to participate or whatever.

I just don't understand people getting angry and indignant over something so simple to fix. There are so many other things out there to get upset about.
emptywig
Huh? What?
Premium Member
join:2002-08-05
Pasadena, TX

1 recommendation

emptywig

Premium Member

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

Nah. What people really get upset about is this growing trend towards businesses shifting to customers things that THEY (the businesses) should be doing as a matter of course. The only thing more annoying is the number of people who seem perfectly willing to accept paying more and more money for less and less service.

And I really resent paying for a service that then uses me as a captive audience to pelt me with ads.

We're SICK OF ADS. TOO MANY ADS! That's what its about, really, just too freakin' many ads EVERYWHERE.

wig

brandon
Some truth included in this post.
Premium Member
join:2003-03-31
Ocean Springs, MS

brandon to RadioDoc

Premium Member

to RadioDoc
said by RadioDoc:

said by poolek:

I understand exactly how DNS works. I also know that I can change the default DNS to point to a provider other than Earthlink and avoid the ads altogether if I want.
That statement shows how much you don't know. I'm sure whoever you are freeloading off of now is mighty glad to have you.

Thanks for avoiding the question though. You proved my point.
...are you kidding? They're public DNS servers for a reason...
poolek
join:2003-11-04
Austin, TX

poolek to RadioDoc

Member

to RadioDoc
Sorry - I didn't see the question until I saw it referenced in another post...

I wouldn't like hearing an ad if I dialed a wrong number. However, if I could stop the ads by making a 5 second change in my voip's configuration, I wouldn't worry about it. I'd make the change and solve the problem.

LinuxJunkie
join:2005-01-19
Cyberspace

LinuxJunkie to RadioDoc

Member

to RadioDoc
Okay, so why would you listen to the ad for 15 seconds before hanging up?

RadioDoc

join:2000-05-11
La Grange, IL

RadioDoc

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

Why should your provider force you to take evasive action?

LinuxJunkie
join:2005-01-19
Cyberspace

LinuxJunkie

Member

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

What's the difference between an ad and that annoying pre-recorded message telling you "the number you have dialed is incorrect..."? Either way, you're going to know you dialed a wrong number and you're just going to hang up and re-dial it anyway. Just like if you type in a non-existent domain name: you'll either get the default browser error page or a page littered with ads as well as a message saying the domain couldn't be found. EITHER WAY, YOU KNOW YOU TYPED IT IN WRONG AND WILL SIMPLY RE-TYPE IT IN ANYWAY.

DrTCP
Yours truly

join:1999-11-09
Round Rock, TX

1 recommendation

DrTCP

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

said by LinuxJunkie:

What's the difference between an ad and that annoying pre-recorded message telling you "the number you have dialed is incorrect..."? Either way, you're going to know you dialed a wrong number and you're just going to hang up and re-dial it anyway.
A human can interpret the web page or a recorded message provided that they can read/understand the language. An automated tool which uses DNS can no longer make the distinction.

You have many more stuff that uses DNS than your simple web browser. Basically to simply display a couple of ads on web browser a whole lot of non-web protocols are effected by this change.

For example, an SMTP server that simply bounced an email to non-existing message will keep trying to deliver messages (sometimes up to 3 days) until it is returned undeliverable. If it was returned an error after DNS lookup the bounce message could get to the user immediately and corrective action could be taken by user before too late.

Besides the while voice "unreachable" message is really intended for humans (there is no protocol to adhere) they have even made provisions for automated dialing machinery. The dee-doo-dee tone preceeding the message is for that.

To cut the long story short. There is a technical standard. When you twist the technical standard like this unusual and abnormal things start to happen. An unexisting domain is not meant to be found by DNS.

neonhomer
Dearborn 5-2750
Premium Member
join:2004-01-27
Edgewater, FL

neonhomer

Premium Member

Re: Glad I kicked there service to the curb

said by DrTCP:
said by LinuxJunkie:

Besides the while voice "unreachable" message is really intended for humans (there is no protocol to adhere) they have even made provisions for automated dialing machinery. The dee-doo-dee tone preceeding the message is for that.
IIRC, the three tones at the beginning of the message are really no longer needed. With everything being digital, those tones no longer do anything, except make you deaf when you hear em.. (they are almost always 200x louder!!) However, we still use touch-tones, so I could be (and probably am) wrong....

As for the EL DNS hijacking.... I noticed that a while back when I fatfingered an URL.... no biggie, just went back and retyped it..... I used to use 4.2.2.1 (IIRC) for my DNS, but my router and Axim get bitchy when I start specifying DNS servers.... (However, I hardly use my Axim anymore.... type to go back to 4.2.2.1 and 2.2.2.2?)

whfsdude
Premium Member
join:2003-04-05
Washington, DC

whfsdude to poolek

Premium Member

to poolek
said by poolek:

What's the big deal? It takes all of 5 seconds to change your router to use a different DNS if the search page offends you. It took me longer to type this message than make the change.
Funny thing you say that. A lot of PPoE routers do not let you specify/change DNS on PPPoE settings because IPCP feeds you the DNS servers.

My current DSL router, an Asante is one of those. Luckily I'm going back to college in a couple of days and I will be back on my RV082 and another ISP. However, my dad has already complained about the search page because he also does thing will he will type something in the address bar and it will taken him to Google.

Vamp
5c077
Premium Member
join:2003-01-28
MD

Vamp

Premium Member

That's dirty

It would be nice to redirect to a page that indicates a DNS lookup issue (that type of thing could be useful in knowing if the site is down or if it's a DNS issue)...

But ads? that's just a dirty thing to do to paying customers.

T1 Rocky
join:2002-11-15
Dallas, TX

T1 Rocky

Member

Re: That's dirty

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't Network Solutions pull the same stunt in about 2003 and got HAMMERED by the internet community.

I think this is a devastated company in an obliviated industry trying to find another way to generate money. The telcos and cable companies are not going to let them survive selling bandwidth so they have to find other avenues to make money. But kudos to earthlink for still being in business. Think about it. How many ISP's can you name now outside of AOL and earthlink?

In the yahoo directory for ISPs in 1998 for Dallas there were 450 ISP's. Today theres less than 10.

Vamp
5c077
Premium Member
join:2003-01-28
MD

Vamp

Premium Member

Re: That's dirty

said by T1 Rocky:

In the yahoo directory for ISPs in 1998 for Dallas there were 450 ISP's. Today theres less than 10.
Simply because back then anyone could run their own ISP, since you didn't need any type of infrastructure with dialup, just a company that allows resellers..

Now dialup is no longer a profitable business for small companies. That's why there is no longer 100s.
byte_me7
join:2006-08-31

byte_me7 to T1 Rocky

Member

to T1 Rocky
I agree that ads are stinky things, and really taking over -- like those thrice-cursed in-window pop-up mimics that cover a vital part of the page....
Even Google's relatively unobtrusive little ads are bothersome.

ISP-wise...I don't have a clue how many are out there, but it seems like ISPs and TV-cable-SPs and landline-SPs and cel-SPs and you-name-it-SPs are all playing one big game of Blob and it's customers that are paying the price. You can hardly tell who's giving you what, nowadays.

How many can I NAME? Well...as you said, outside AOL (which has dial-up and broadband) and Earthlink...

Yahoo!, which T1 Rocky actually mentioned ("In the yahoo directory...")
SBC/DSL, which may or may not be Yahoo...
Comcast
ATT/Cingular
there's a few more that some very computer-savvy friends of mine use, but I don't know the names. The list is pitiful. I can hardly use up all the fingers on my mouse hand!

Any situation where the provider of a service, especially a service with an attached fee, frobs/tinkers/tweaks with the service in order to use that service in a way not to the benifit of the consumer is really not in the best interests of the consumer...and while it might take more time to protest, if nobody protests then things can only get worse.

T1 Rocky
join:2002-11-15
Dallas, TX

T1 Rocky

Member

Re: That's dirty


Yahoo!, which T1 Rocky actually mentioned ("In the yahoo directory...")
SBC/DSL, which may or may not be Yahoo...
Comcast
ATT/Cingular



Not to be a dork but to further illustrate the point that there is no competition, you named 2 companies. SBC, yahoo dsl, AT&T and Cingular are all the same company - AT&T.

Regarding that anyone could be an ISP in the 90s, that's totally true and many companies were mismanaged. But I think those were the minority. DSL was the death of the ISP industry. The telecom act of 1996 was created so that the government could give everyone "dumb pipes" and then you could connect your ISP to the dumb pipe (like in South Korea where they are now at 80% broadband to every residence.) The US government awarded implementing the dumb pipes to the telcos (and billions of dollars) and by 2000, the telcos had decided that they wanted the bandwidth market as well. Their lobbying dollars kept Washington looking the other way. And now America is the #11 most wired country in the world and there are no more ISPs.

If you want to take it a step further, The telcos have now decided that they want control of the wireless market (check out the latest news article on the front page of dslreports.com) and the content on the internet (net neutrality.) None of this is good for the consumer.

DrTCP
Yours truly

join:1999-11-09
Round Rock, TX

DrTCP to Vamp

to Vamp
said by Vamp:

It would be nice to redirect to a page that indicates a DNS lookup issue (that type of thing could be useful in knowing if the site is down or if it's a DNS issue)...

But ads? that's just a dirty thing to do to paying customers.
Even if there was no ads this sort of behavior breaks a number of applications. Anti-spam filtering for non-existing domains is one, if you have some Windows DNS search path (which tries different domain suffixes in the search path) it does not work. If you are VPN'ing to the work the internal domains may become unaccessible. There are a whole lot of issues about it.

n2jtx
join:2001-01-13
Glen Head, NY

1 recommendation

n2jtx

Member

Same Old Nonsense

Didn't they learn anything from Verisign's fiasco in doing the same thing? Granted they do not have as much impact as changing the entire DNS infrastructure for the Internet but come on Ken. Don't you guys pay attention to previous mistakes?

c0de8
join:2004-10-14
Richmond, VA

c0de8

Member

what about working sites

what prevents them from adding in a redirect to a site, even if the domain/site does exist. is this the next step in internet content controll ???
fiberguy2
My views are my own.
Premium Member
join:2005-05-20

fiberguy2

Premium Member

Re: what about working sites

said by c0de8:

what prevents them from adding in a redirect to a site, even if the domain/site does exist. is this the next step in internet content controll ???
Do you know how DNS works? If not, you shouldn't be posting.

What if they decided to simply block certain sites? What if they decided to append bannders to all your sites? What if? what if?

In laymen terms, if a 404 error code is returned, they are redirecting THAT traffic.

To answer your question, NOTHING "prevents" them from doing it... however, they know better.

c0de8
join:2004-10-14
Richmond, VA

c0de8

Member

Re: what about working sites

i actually do know how DNS works, and its really quite easy to redirect a DNS query to a different server. and it was a retorical question, i was not expecting an answer...

koitsu
MVM
join:2002-07-16
Mountain View, CA
Humax BGW320-500

koitsu

MVM

Impact is major.

Does Earthlink realise the impact of their change? COMPLETELY forget about the HTTP/Web aspect here...

Think about SMTP. Think about spam. Think about spam *filters*.

Think about DNS. Think about diagnostics. Think about troubleshooting. Think about NXDOMAIN.

*sigh* Just like with VeriSign, this is going to break spam filters and diagnostics for *tons* of stuff. Earthlink, reconsider. If you want to do this with HTTP traffic by monitoring Host: headers or something utterly bizarre, fine (I still won't use your service) -- LEAVE DNS ALONE.

MxxCon
join:1999-11-19
Brooklyn, NY

1 edit

MxxCon

Member

This is no better

this is no better than attaching advertisement to every outgoing or incoming email. i might be justifiable for a free service, but
PEOPLE ARE PAYING $MONEY FOR EARTHLINK SERVICE. THEY SHOULD NOT TO HAVE THAT KIND OF CRAP!

barqsdrinker
What Can I Photograph Today?
Premium Member
join:2001-02-26
Apo, AE

barqsdrinker

Premium Member

I guess...

...that the ISP's don't get it. THEY ARE JUST A DUMB PIPE. That's all they should be. They need to quit trying to have me load their bloat/spy/adware junk. They need to quit pushing ads in my face.

VR Laura
Queen Of Cyberspace
Premium Member
join:2002-02-10
NYC

VR Laura

Premium Member

Do as I say, not as I...

Fwiw, I just did a test. I typed »eartlink.net (EART not EARTH) in my browser and guess what? I got the NORMAL error page, i.e. "This page cannot be found". Funny how Earthlink isn't applying their new *cough* "feature" to typos on their name. Ditto for typing »earthlin.net/ (no K).

Laura
VR Laura

1 edit

VR Laura

Premium Member

Earthlink, analyze THIS

Dave Coustan of Earthlink wrote in their official blog, "We'll be watching the system closely and analyzing performance data to make sure we're right about this, and we're listening to our users as well as the conversations online."

Hopefully, all current Earthlink customers -- and those just thinking about subscribing -- will post a comment in their blog about the negative impact of what they're doing. I just did.
»blogs.earthlink.net/2006 ··· ns_1.php

Laura (Earthlink subscriber for 9 years)

•••••••••••

ufokillerz
join:2000-10-02
New York, NY

ufokillerz

Member

tracking packages on ups.com

i can't track packages on ups since this happened..

Some1cares
@verizon.net

Some1cares

Anon

Re: tracking packages on ups.com

care to explain how this makes it impossible to track UPS?