VeriSign's rapid DNS updates in .com/.net

Fri Jul 23 07:24:17 UTC 2004

because i have sometimes been accused of being unfair to markk, i checked.

markk at verisignlabs.com (Mark Kosters) writes:

> > > the primary beneficiaries of this new functionality are spammers and
> > > other malfeasants,
> > 
> > I think this is a true statement. 
> 
> Has anyone done any studies to prove this conjecture?

at dictionary.reference.com we see the following:

| con·jec·ture     P   Pronunciation Key  (kn-jkchr)
| n. 
| 
| 1. Inference or judgment based on inconclusive or incomplete evidence;
|    guesswork.
|  
| 2. A statement, opinion, or conclusion based on guesswork: The commentators
|    made various conjectures about the outcome of the next election.

as the author of the statement in question, and based on the definition
shown, it's just not conjecture.

> If this was true, maybe those registries who do perform this particular
> service today ought to slow down their update frequency.

as others have pointed out, spammers will always find a way to spam, and
while the number of cases where the beneficiary is not a spammer is small,
it's not zero.  so we have to do it.  but when someone says, later, that
the .COM zone generator ought to use a ttl template of 300 rather than
86400 in order that changes and deletions can get the same speedy service
as additions, i hope that icann will say "no."

wrt the mit paper on why small ttl's are harmless, i recommend that y'all
actually read it, the whole thing, plus some of the references, rather
than assuming that the abstract is well supported by the body.
-- 
Paul Vixie