Read the article: Will the blockchain be the future of domain names?

1. What is DNS? What is the status quo?

DNS (Domain Name System) is like the phone book of the Internet, which converts easy-to-understand domain names into specific Internet IP address protocols, so that browsers such as Google Chrome and Microsoft IE can retrieve the correct website for users.

DNS has evolved since 1983 to meet the ever-changing needs of the Internet. For DNS to function correctly, it must provide users with continuous availability, data integrity, and privacy, ensuring that third parties cannot easily analyze an individual user's browsing history. However, DNS packets are usually not encrypted, and when a user sends a request to a DNS server, the DNS server and everyone else on the route (including the Internet provider and anyone else connected to the WiFi) know what website the user is visiting.

Currently, DNS is managed centrally by ICAAN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), a non-profit international organization located in the United States, in which the registry manages the first-level root system. For example, VeriSign is the registry of the domain name .com. Domain names with a .com suffix are managed by VeriSign. The registrar/registrar (registrar) manages the secondary system and provides domain name registration services to registrants in the marketplace.

Today, giant companies such as Cloudflare, GoDaddy, Amazon, Google, and Namecheap dominate the field of domain name registration, providing domain registration and rental services to users in a centralized manner that is not private, democratic, or secure. They can delete customers' domain names at any time, while also exposing those domain names to the risk of hacking and information hijacking.

The most common attacks on domain names are DNS hijacking or redirection attacks, DDOS (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks, and DNS tunneling attacks.

DNS hijacking or redirection attacks: These attacks redirect users from expected URLs to other malicious websites, direct users to enter personal information, or download viruses or malware to their computers.

DDOS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack: A large number of small access requests are aggregated into a huge data flow, causing the server to fail to work normally. The DDOS attack on the website is only one aspect. If the servers of major registrars or even ICANN itself are attacked by DDOS, most of the network may be paralyzed, causing economic losses and even political chaos.

DNS Tunneling: Bypassing firewalls and other security measures, injecting large amounts of toxic data through the DNS path. Hackers can control problematic domain names through DNS tunnels and steal large amounts of domain name data. This is the method used by notorious Iranian hackers to damage corporate and government websites in the United States, Israel and other countries.

Traditional Domain Name System Working Mechanism

2. Blockchain domain name and its advantages

Based on the huge data and inherent security risks of DNS, we can use the distributed nature of the blockchain to store this information on hundreds of nodes around the world, maximizing the resistance to hacker attacks on the premise of ensuring safe encryption.

Blockchain domain names are created by smart contracts and usually must use special domain extensions such as .eth or .coin. Domain owners receive a private key after registering their extension on the blockchain. Domain names can be fully controlled with a private key without the need to apply for approval or registration with an external centralized organization. These domains are similar to blockchain wallets to which users can send cryptocurrency payments directly.

Blockchain DNS is different from other blockchain systems in that its suppliers generally provide each node with equal voting rights. In general, all nodes must participate in a "vote" to approve DNS changes. While the system isn't perfect, it helps prevent "whales," or powerful groups of nodes from dominating the system from making harmful changes, effectively defending against hacking.

Another benefit of decentralization of blockchain domains is that they are not easily taken down by governments and corporate entities. For journalists and activists, who face the constant threat of content removal or “censorship,” and for countries where a free press does not exist, anti-censorship would go a long way toward boosting democratic freedoms.

Working Mechanism of Blockchain Domain Name System

3. How to access the blockchain domain name?

As far as the status quo is concerned, blockchain domain names only account for a small part of the number of existing domain names, and more than 99% of domain names are registered with ICANN in the traditional way. At the same time, accessing blockchain domain names is difficult without a browser extension or a specific browser.

Currently, the three most common browser extensions used to access blockchain domains are:

FriGate: Designed for Google Chrome, FriGate fully supports EmerDNS domains. EmerDNS is one of the largest decentralized DNS on the market today.

Blockchain DNS: Designed for Firefox, Blockchain DNS is a multi-purpose add-on that allows regular users to access blockchain domains.

PeerName: Available for Chrome, Firefox, and Opera, users can register .coin, .lib, .emc, and .bazar extensions and domain names through PeerName's user-friendly web interface.

If you want to register a blockchain domain name, there are many providers on the market to choose from. Some of the top blockchain domain name providers currently include: EmerCoin, NameCoin, Stack, Ethereum Name Service, Handshake , Unstoppable Domains.

4. How does the oracle help blockchain domain names?

Like other blockchain products and services, effective blockchain DNS, domain name providers, and the websites they host must access a wealth of external information, including things like financial information, news information, and weather and environmental data. As blockchain DNS and escrow services evolve, the need for external data will only continue to increase, at which point a robust oracle solution is required.

SupraOracle's oracle solution can provide secure, high-speed and accurate external information for blockchain DNS providers and blockchain hosting services. With its cross-chain interoperability, powerful decentralized consensus mechanism, extremely high-speed finality and ultra-secure parallel processing encryption technology, SupraOracles can help providers create and protect next-generation Internet domain names, help DNS providers and their Blockchain domains want to unlock their full potential.

5. Write at the end

Although blockchain technology has great potential to disrupt and improve the way domain names operate, the blockchain DNS industry is still in its infancy, and currently blockchain domain names account for only 0.1% or even less of the total number of domain names. Accessing and creating blockchain domain names also relies on special browser extensions and small domain name providers, but what we can expect is that organizations like ICANN may also participate in blockchain protocols in the future, so domain names and network security A new era will follow.