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DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

status.namecheap.com

61–70 of 119 posts

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#61
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just for future reference, it's usually considered a good idea to put your status page on completely independent infrastructure so that it stays up even when the rest of your stuff goes down. A status page that doesn't work during an outage isn't particularly useful.

Like!

Not having separate status hosting is liken not salting passwords. As a NC user, I may leave just for this reason

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#62
post #51
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I moved most of my stuff to Route53 awhile back and for the most part I don't regret it.

We looked at Route 53, but would that make a difference today if your domain is registered at Namecheap? If Namecheap is down, it does not get redirected.

If you don't use namecheap's dns servers, dns requests for your domain do not go to namecheap for redirection. They don't go to namecheap at all. Your specified dns servers get registered with the top level domain servers.

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was going to switch to route 53 while you guys were down and switch back, but the page says it'll take a day...Might as well just wait at that point. I know it's panic mode over there, but some kind of failover record would be awesome for when this happens in the future(or an option for one).

Everything related to DNS says it'll take a day but that's "worst case"... I've successfully transferred DNS for 5 Namecheap-registered domains to Route 53 since this all started a couple hours ago, and they're now up & running smoothly. Their "update DNS server" page was acting a bit wonky, kept saying some of my nameservers were invalid when they weren't, but I eventually got them all switched. This isn't a dig aga…

Yeah, Route53 isn't as feature rich though. Also I have the same problem, keeps giving me errors about bad nameservers. I guess I'll keep trying.

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#64
post #51
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I moved most of my stuff to Route53 awhile back and for the most part I don't regret it.

We looked at Route 53, but would that make a difference today if your domain is registered at Namecheap? If Namecheap is down, it does not get redirected.

If you use Route 53, your zone file is still at Namecheap (registrar). Doesn't that still make Namecheap a failure point?

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#65
post #15

We are in the process of mitigating a large scale DDoS attack against our global DNS platform. We expect service to return to normal very shortly. Stay tuned and let me know if you have any questions. ted@namecheap.com

Most DDOS attacks against a company like yours are actually attacks against a specific customer. If: a) you had a pool of DNS server names, say 20, all with unrelated hostnames b) you assigned 2 to each customer, randomly, when they configured a domain to use your servers. Then, a DDOS attack would impact 10% of your customers instead of 100%. (Assuming other practices, like null routing the target until resolved)

Yes, this. Hopefully they take heed after this painful experience.

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#66
post #46
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just for future reference, it's usually considered a good idea to put your status page on completely independent infrastructure so that it stays up even when the rest of your stuff goes down. A status page that doesn't work during an outage isn't particularly useful.

Good point. The status page is on another cloud but since this is a DNS issue, the subdomain is down. In the future, we'll investigate running this page on a secondary DNS.

Posting up-to-the-minute updates on Twitter is also a good idea. Lots of tweets come back from a search for "Namecheap" & you want to be sure you're a part of that conversation!

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#67
post #64
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We looked at Route 53, but would that make a difference today if your domain is registered at Namecheap? If Namecheap is down, it does not get redirected.

If you use Route 53, your zone file is still at Namecheap (registrar). Doesn't that still make Namecheap a failure point?

No. The zone file lives on the nameserver (DNS server) which Route 53 provides. Namescheap registers a list of nameservers for your domain with the TLD.

An over simplified example for looking up "news.ycombinator.com":

1. First query the TLD nameserver for all ".com" domains asking for the authoritative nameserver(s) for "ycombinator.com".

2. Next query that nameserver for "news.ycombinator.com".

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#68
post #15

We are in the process of mitigating a large scale DDoS attack against our global DNS platform. We expect service to return to normal very shortly. Stay tuned and let me know if you have any questions. ted@namecheap.com

hi already have OK's, but the DNS are all using the same IP :( bad sign?

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#69
post #15

We are in the process of mitigating a large scale DDoS attack against our global DNS platform. We expect service to return to normal very shortly. Stay tuned and let me know if you have any questions. ted@namecheap.com

You guys should add an option for us to put in an optional backup DNS record in the settings.

Re: DDOS on Namecheap Free DNS and Default DNS V2

#70
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the hackers really want to take you down, adding another server in isn't very hard...

If you're as big as NameCheap, you can afford to pay CloudFlare or somebody like it to protect your status page.

Cloudflare has also been nailed the last 3 weeks in a row causing outages. Just search Twitter for cloudflare DDOS or NTP or etc. etc. etc. At the end of the day there are currently so many slave machines out there we are all vulnerable. It's just the nature of things. At least outages are only temporary. It's much better than the early days were we'd be down for 12 hours at a time. https://twitter.com/search?q=cloudflare%20attack&src=typd
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