What is 1.1.1.1?
Before we know what is 1.1.1.1, it is crucial to understand it is quite essential to understand what DNS is? Without knowing the concept on DNS understanding 1.1.1.1 would be baseless.
DNS or Domain Name System is a directory for the internet. Users can access information over the internet through domain names, for example, facebook.com, google.com, etc. A browser is supposed to interact over Internet Protocol (IP) address. DNS acts as a medium, and it translates the name of the domains into its IP address so that the user can gather the necessary information he/she is looking for.
Any device that connects to the internet needs a DNS resolver.
Now the question what is a DNS resolver?
A DNS resolver is responsible for finding the particular site that a user wants to find. First of all, it is supposed to reach the root server to ask where to find the TLD “.com” then the resolver will ask”.com” where to find “example”. From there, the domain name is sent to a Domain Name Resolver (DNR), located within individual ISPs or organizations and once the resolver has the final IP address, it returns with the result as shown the web page on your device.
Well, 1.1.1.1 is a DNS resolver/ Service integrated by Cloudflare in partnership with Asia Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC). Its service was announced on 1st April 2018. Cloudflare claims that it is the fastest privacy-first consumer DNS service. Over time, Cloudflare announced the mobile version on 11th of November 2018. The application is available on Google Play Store for Android user, and App Stores for I phone users. It is said to be a public DNS resolver. Unlike others, it is ads free that is quite a massive relief to the serious internet users like me. We often get annoyed by the constant tendency of ads. According to Cloudflare, 1.1.1.1 tends to be the fastest resolver to date.
Keep reading! It’s going to get interesting now. The question is why anyone should switch to a third party DNS resolver?
Well isn’t it quite obvious? What do we need most on the internet?
Any guesses? The answer is security. Most of the ISPs are prone to the threats. They do not provide strong encryption which makes the DNS queries vulnerable to the malware attacks and data breaches. ISPs also keep the record or I should say they track the usage activity of a user. If an ISP recourse is flooded with enough traffic, it may crash and stop answering the requests. It results in DNS attacks, i.e. denial of service.
1.1.1.1 Offers some unique security features other than various public DNS
services. A significant concern is that the data are used for mining purpose and censorship. Unlike, other DNS services providers, 1.1.1.1 does not collect the data of customers for commercial purpose. 1.1.1.1 says they do not keep the logs of user’s data for more than 24 hours.
Is it secure as it claimed to be?
Cloudflare has exposed the misconfigurations in existing setups and also violated internet standards. Many routers of Cisco Systems have abused it. Well, the pros and cons are two sides of the same coins. In spite of several claiming about privacy-first policy, Cloudflare is at least going share DNS query data with APNIC for 5 years against the use of 1.1.1.1 network address. So I cannot say that you are 100 percent secure over this particular DNS resolver. The best thing about this service is that it is ads free which is really impressive. It can prevent adware and malware infection for sure. On the other hand, APNIC is quite interested in understanding the technical framework as well as the infrastructure
along with the intricacies of the DNS over the internet. They are wholly committed to preventing denial of service attacks.
Is it going to improve the speed?
Off course you might be having this question in mind from a long time. Let’s get through this. Medium.com did a performance test over Cloudflare’s 1.1.1.1 from eighteen different locations across the world. After running 70 DNS lookups nearly for an hour over different popular domains, the result is under 15ms response time across United States, Canada, and Europe. For Asia and South America, there is quite a significant difference in performance. So I must say that the performance depends on where you live. You may experience different speeds in different locations.
As I conclude, I must say that it is an excellent initiative by Cloudflare. It is quite exciting to have an independent DNS over HTTPS ISPs. It may open gateways for various new browsers, operating systems, routers and applications to create something new over experimenting over unknown. Overall it would be fascinating to see how it reacts to new protocols that can be a better and secure platform over the internet. If you are thinking about switching, I hope this information can help you to judge whether you should contact old ISP or switch over DNS 1.1.1.1.
