Cox Tests DNS Redirection - Though they provide unimpacted DNS servers...
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korym @ 19th May 08:41AM:
OpenDNS all over?
Looks like they're taking cues from OpenDNS. I wonder if they'll offer phishing services as well.
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supergirl @ 19th May 08:43AM:
I drop them over that and the rip-off
Cox here (Gulf Coast) added "permaboost" which really just makes you look like you are getting what you are paying for. I got a solid 12/1 connection before it. After it was 8/1 with downloads at 10 down. So, I was paying for 12/1 and getting 2/3rds the speed.
Surfing brought a lot of those Cox pages, full of frickin ads, if the URL didn't resolved fast enough. BellSouth hasn't that problem and I'm saving $25 a month over Cox.
I also never saw 1 mbps up mostly 500 up.
If you call and threaten to go DSL, they will drop your price in half for 2 months.
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supergirl @ 19th May 08:46AM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
Also, I noticed Yahoo IM didn't work a lot. It would all of the sudden lose connection.
They were definitely throttling YouTube.
Cox also had a search function on their page.
Cox used to allow it to go to google.
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the niTz @ 19th May 09:33AM:
atleast
they give u the option to bypass it with out using 3rd party servers
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ColorBASIC @ 19th May 10:49AM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
Then call every 2 months and use other DNS servers unless you have a good alternative available.
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ColorBASIC @ 19th May 11:00AM:
Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
All the complaints in the world isn't going to change the ISP trend of taking advantage of their customers to make a buck every chance they get.
While lame at least they're providing unaffected servers from day one. I remember when DSL Extreme pulled this crap and their customers blew their stacks. Of course later offering unaffected servers did little to shut them up.
There is ZERO benefit that will go to the customers. Cox will simply pocket the money because like all ISPs they're greedy whores. It's one thing to simply charge for the monthly service, it's quite another to take advantage of leech off customers mistakes to the detriment of the domain name system.
The ONLY thing that will stop this is customers cancelling. So who will be the first Cox customer to cancel over this? Any takers?
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TK Junk Mail @ 19th May 11:15AM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
said by ColorBASIC :
Then call every 2 months and use other DNS servers unless you have a good alternative available.
Use your own PC based DNS service. I use treewalk to handle my DNS needs. It has worked without any problems for the last year. »www.ntcanuck.com/
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ColorBASIC @ 19th May 11:22AM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
As far as DNS goes, it's one the of few things Verizon does right.
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GlennAllen @ 19th May 12:15PM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
TreeWalk is great; I've been using it for quite a few years. Simply installing it, however, won't help someone much with this kind of stuff. TreeWalk will simply cache your successful lookups so that if/when your regular DNS server availability becomes "problematic", you'll still be able to find the sites you've visited before. New lookups will still go out to the next level DNS (the default being whatever you were using when you installed TreeWalk), and, as you'd expect, unsuccessful lookups--which is what you'd have here--won't be cached. Now, you could both install TreeWalk and point it to a higher level--or "real"--DNS to bypass DNS "redirection" sites and to avoid other non-spec DNS problems.
I don't know... does it really matter? If they're redirecting only browser requests, probably not. If they're screwing up non-browser requests, then probably so.
Either way, using something like TreeWalk is usually a good idea.
--
Wherever you go, there you are.
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SimbaTLK1 @ 19th May 12:50PM:
Interesting...
All the complaints about Cox this and Cox that, while only halfway down the page in yesterday's news: »'A Cable Company People Don't Hate' Perhaps Cox isn't as loved as they want to believe.
--Matt
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jgkolt @ 19th May 01:54PM:
Re: Interesting...
i switched to opendns some time ago so i don't know how their new dns is.
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bmn @ 19th May 02:48PM:
Oh hell now...
Come on Cox, your network guys always seem to have prided themselves in trying to maintain a standards compliant network and now you go and pull a Verisign ? Nice job on listening to the bone headed idiot from with a BUSINESS school IT degree who knows jack about the network and just for a LITTLE bit more revenue.
I just HOPE they don't start foisting this stuff on the CBS customers. THAT would royally piss some folks off.
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Prove it...
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dynodb @ 19th May 02:51PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Am I missing something here? I know it's a little annoying to be redirected after mistyping a URL, but as often as not you end up at a link farm anyways even without the redirect.
Unless it's causing actual problems aside from the minor annoyance of being redirected instead of a 404 error, I don't understand the outrage.
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fiberguy @ 19th May 03:15PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Wow! And you work for one of the major ISPs?
Maybe people like using their own default search engines which open up on a 404.
Maybe people like to have less spam and for their filters to work correctly and fail.
There are a number of 'technical' reasons why this is a horrible idea and why it's CONSTANTLY under scrutiny when ever any greedy company does this... It's not the job of an ISP to redirect traffic ANYWHERE other than where the user has intended OR mis-intended.
But seriously, I certainly am not surprised someone in your position wouldn't get it.
--
"Complaining is the least path of resistance for the self-reitchous and lazy..."
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nixen @ 19th May 03:42PM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
said by TK Junk Mail :said by ColorBASIC :
Then call every 2 months and use other DNS servers unless you have a good alternative available.
Use your own PC based DNS service. I use treewalk to handle my DNS needs. It has worked without any problems for the last year. »
www.ntcanuck.com/ All of which assumes a provider never decides to do a transparent proxy of port 53. One of them will eventually try that.
--
Everyday, thousands of new cars are delivered to their new owners with poorly-selected radio station presets.
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nixen @ 19th May 03:46PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
said by dynodb :
Am I missing something here? I know it's a little annoying to be redirected after mistyping a URL, but as often as not you end up at a link farm anyways even without the redirect.
Unless it's causing actual problems aside from the minor annoyance of being redirected instead of a 404 error, I don't understand the outrage.
For most home users, it doesn't cause a problem. Where it causes real heartburn is if they do it to business subscribers. Outside of that, it's mostly a "principles" thing.
--
Everyday, thousands of new cars are delivered to their new owners with poorly-selected radio station presets.
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dynodb @ 19th May 03:46PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Oh no! I was redirected to an ISP page instead of a 404 error! The humanity! Now I'll have to look at an ISP page instead of a 404 screen for the 5 seconds it takes to retype the URL! The horror! :uhh:
I can see how it would minor annoyance in the rare occasion that you mistype a URL, but the "OMG GREEDY EVIL ISP BASTARDS!" outrage seems disproportionate over what seems to me to be a pretty minor issue- especially when there are painless ways around it.
I'm pretty ambivalent about the whole thing; the complaints seem not to revolve around any technical problems caused, but by the fact that their using this to make a few extra bucks.
And just exactly how does this affect spam filters?
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dynodb @ 19th May 04:48PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Well, since no one surfs the web while at work, it shouldn't be a problem :D
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nixen @ 19th May 04:53PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
said by dynodb :
Well, since no one surfs the web while at work, it shouldn't be a problem :D
Has nothing to do with that. Has to do with the problems it can cause for infrastructure systems.
--
Everyday, thousands of new cars are delivered to their new owners with poorly-selected radio station presets.
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zerog @ 19th May 05:09PM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
it will likely come with the "save the children" package of internet restriction tools designed to filter out porn and meds sites...
btw.. Transparent DNS redirection will most certainly break LOTS of stuff...
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fiberguy @ 19th May 05:14PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Again, it's funny that you don't understand that...
You're wrong. Maybe in THIS particular forum people are focusing on the ads and the revenue, but just about every one in the past (usually posted on weekdays) HAVE in fact focused on the technical aspect of the DNS redirects.
The beauty of computers and websites with databased forums is you can look it up.. it's been talked about in great length here.
And, as I stated, it's NOT the job of the ISP to redirect mistyped domains.. it's not the point about the ads. The ISP are, in a single switch, disabling features of the web browser and the end user's software when they redirect all 404s to THEIR page. As I stated, when if I want to search from my address bar? The redirect takes that away. When spam filters do a reverse look up on the domain from spoofed emails, it reverts back and the domain resolves. There are MANY technical reasons why this is a bad idea.
If it was such a great thing, then why are they providing alternate DNS? Why was Network Solutions told to knock it off?
There are plenty of reasons why ISPs need to keep their hands off of 404 pages.
As I said, TODAY it may be focused on the ads and the "few bucks" but in every other posting it has all been about the technical aspect of it all.
"Oh no! I was redirected to an ISP page instead of a 404 error! The humanity! Now I'll have to look at an ISP page instead of a 404 screen for the 5 seconds it takes to retype the URL! The horror! :uhh:"
I'm sure that all of the ISP suits are saying the same thing while on their way out to the country club for a liquid lunch and game of golf while "not getting it" either.
--
"Complaining is the least path of resistance for the self-reitchous and lazy..."
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zerog @ 19th May 05:57PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Ok, somebody help me out.. I'm confused about this tangential 404 thread. I was under the assumption that this was about "dns redirection upon failed dns lookups" which would seemingly have little to do with 404 errors or http redirection.
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zerog @ 19th May 06:08PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Can someone post some specific examples of what this will break exactly?
In most corporate VPN scenarios, the corporate DNS servers are used during the VPN session and (usually) all traffic is routed through the corporate network.
I am certainly against such a practice unless the customers are fully aware and the practice can benefit the customer somehow (ie, through price breaks, increased speeds, etc)
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nixen @ 19th May 06:52PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
said by zerog :
Can someone post some specific examples of what this will break exactly?
Authoritative report presented to ICANN.
said by zerog :
In most corporate VPN scenarios, the corporate DNS servers are used during the VPN session and (usually) all traffic is routed through the corporate network.
Not every business runs their own DNS. Not even most do. Aside from that, if the connectivity provider decides that they well do a transparent proxy of port 53 traffic to capture DNS queries, your results will be modified, regardless of whether you run your own server.
said by zerog :
I am certainly against such a practice unless the customers are fully aware
"Effective immediately, the following change will be made. You have no recourse."
said by zerog :
and the practice can benefit the customer somehow (ie, through price breaks, increased speeds, etc)
Get real.
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Everyday, thousands of new cars are delivered to their new owners with poorly-selected radio station presets.
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cghh @ 19th May 07:31PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
said by dynodb :
I can see how it would minor annoyance in the rare occasion that you mistype a URL, but the "OMG GREEDY EVIL ISP BASTARDS!" outrage seems disproportionate over what seems to me to be a pretty minor issue- especially when there are painless ways around it.
And just exactly how does this affect spam filters?
Other than short-circuiting your personal choice of a "404 handler" in your browser, the biggest problem with this perversion of DNS is a result of the fact that the Internet is a whole lot more than the World Wide Web!!! ALL Internet services that use DNS are broken by this behavior, not just web browsers; they can no longer handle unresolved DNS addresses in their own way, like trying alternative addresses and such.
Concerning spam filters, one common kind of filtering to verify that the From address is an existing domain, and with this broken behavior, ALL addresses come back "existing".
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RangerTX @ 19th May 07:57PM:
Re: OpenDNS all over?
dslextreme also tried it and failed when member started changing their review and giving them low ratings
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IPingUPing @ 19th May 09:03PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
Check the original forum post from coxengr.
»Gulf Coast test info
"These enhanced error results are designed to help the average user more quickly reach their web destinations, and only affect web page responses ('A' records to those in the know)."
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dvd536 @ 19th May 09:17PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
said by dynodb :
Am I missing something here? I know it's a little annoying to be redirected after mistyping a URL, but as often as not you end up at a link farm anyways even without the redirect.
Unless it's causing actual problems aside from the minor annoyance of being redirected instead of a 404 error, I don't understand the outrage.
because a 404 isn't generating revenue off our backs which we see none of and you know how slow cox's DNS can be. i dont want 75% of my lookups to annoy me.
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You can never be too rich, too thin or have too much Bandwidth
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dvd536 @ 19th May 09:19PM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
said by nixen :said by TK Junk Mail :said by ColorBASIC :
Then call every 2 months and use other DNS servers unless you have a good alternative available.
Use your own PC based DNS service. I use treewalk to handle my DNS needs. It has worked without any problems for the last year. »
www.ntcanuck.com/ All of which assumes a provider never decides to do a transparent proxy of port 53. One of them will eventually try that.
A provider cant filter/block ports on the LOCAL side, only at the modem.
--
You can never be too rich, too thin or have too much Bandwidth
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nixen @ 19th May 09:24PM:
Re: I drop them over that and the rip-off
said by dvd536 :
A provider cant filter/block ports on the LOCAL side, only at the modem.
And...?
If your access to the Internet-at-large goes through my networks, I can do whatever the hell I want to your traffic. So, even if you point your DNS entries to OpenDNS, I can still redirect them to my DNS servers. So, do what you want inside your LAN, I really don't care. But, the moment you're sending packets beyond your LAN, they're mine to do with as I please.
--
Everyday, thousands of new cars are delivered to their new owners with poorly-selected radio station presets.
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dvd536 @ 19th May 09:41PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
said by fiberguy :
Again, it's funny that you don't understand that...
You're wrong. Maybe in THIS particular forum people are focusing on the ads and the revenue, but just about every one in the past (usually posted on weekdays) HAVE in fact focused on the technical aspect of the DNS redirects.
The beauty of computers and websites with databased forums is you can look it up.. it's been talked about in great length here.
And, as I stated, it's NOT the job of the ISP to redirect mistyped domains.. it's not the point about the ads. The ISP are, in a single switch, disabling features of the web browser and the end user's software when they redirect all 404s to THEIR page. As I stated, when if I want to search from my address bar? The redirect takes that away. When spam filters do a reverse look up on the domain from spoofed emails, it reverts back and the domain resolves. There are MANY technical reasons why this is a bad idea.
If it was such a great thing, then why are they providing alternate DNS? Why was Network Solutions told to knock it off?
There are plenty of reasons why ISPs need to keep their hands off of 404 pages.
As I said, TODAY it may be focused on the ads and the "few bucks" but in every other posting it has all been about the technical aspect of it all.
"Oh no! I was redirected to an ISP page instead of a 404 error! The humanity! Now I'll have to look at an ISP page instead of a 404 screen for the 5 seconds it takes to retype the URL! The horror!
If its not about the ads[sponsored which cox gets paid for] why not leave it alone or redir to cox.net? because there's no MONEY in that. uh huh uh huh.
--
You can never be too rich, too thin or have too much Bandwidth
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major marco @ 19th May 11:26PM:
BFD
What's the difference if you use OpenDNS or shitty Cox DNS. The only reason I found OpenDNS in the first place is because a website I frequent changed its DNS servers and Cox's never caught on and subsequently, wouldn't load the page. I thought the site was down for 2 months until I figured out it was Cox's dumbass servers.
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xplicitmind @ 20th May 03:16AM:
Honestly...
I can't think of the last time I used my ISP's default DNS servers ... even with RoadRunner Premium, I still use Level 3's DNS Servers.
Level 3 DNS Servers
- 4.2.2.1
- 4.2.2.2
- 4.2.2.3
PS ... that's what all of you Verizon FIOS users have, because Verizon uses Level 3's DNS servers for its FIOS service...
Xplicit
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Jmartz @ 20th May 03:16PM:
Re: OpenDNS all over?
said by korym :
Looks like they're taking cues from OpenDNS. I wonder if they'll offer phishing services as well.
OpenDNS is useful though. Like »www.dslreports.con would redirect you to .COM. OpenDNS also has keywords that you just type in "weather" and it brings you to whatever you tell it to bring you to... in that example, you wuold go to the weather channel local forecast page for your area... It's actually very useful. But without the advertisements.
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korym @ 20th May 08:05PM:
Re: OpenDNS all over?
That's why I use OpenDNS at the school where I maintain the network. Many useful features.
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cghh @ 20th May 08:26PM:
Re: Lame but unavoidable, all ISPs are whores
said by IPingUPing :Check the original forum post from coxengr.
»
Gulf Coast test info"These enhanced error results are designed to help the average user more quickly reach their web destinations, and only affect web page responses ('A' records to those in the know)."
It may not effect the MX (Mail eXchange) records, but when there is no MX record for a host, e-mail systems fall back to look for A records, so the mail system will still be confused by the broken behavior. And essentially all other Internet services, such as FTP, telnet, and so on, look for A records. 'A' records are the generic result of a host name lookup, and are not specific in any way to web browsers, and have been used from the time the DNS system was invented, long before http was around. Saying that the change only effects web page responses is just plain wrong.
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