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My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

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Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#111

Post by driverdan »

shawnz wrote: post #25
zamazingo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you want your own dns server used at all times.

But why would you care about that? You're already connecting to Google's service, YouTube, so what does it change to use Google's DNS to resolve it? What is the circumstance where you'd care about not using Google's DNS but then connect to a Google service anyway? If Chromecasts allowed arbitrary web browsing, I would maybe see your point -- but they don't.

> But why would you care about that?

The reason doesn't matter. We should be in control of our own networks. Google shouldn't be deciding for us.

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#112

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

FakeComments wrote: post #47
apostacy wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't a case of an IOT device though. My Chromecast went through massive amount of trouble to use Google's DNS servers, to serve ads behind my pi-hole. It would respect all of my DHCP parameters, but silently ignore DNS settings. It was clearly intentional to serve ads. I had to set up a firewall to force it to use my DNS server. And eventually even that stopped working with an update (which themselves are reall…

> would rather fail completely than not be able to serve you ads. Google is an ad company; if you don’t watch the ads, you’re not a useful product. It doesn’t matter you “bought a product”, this behavior is their corporate DNA. It’s the Office to their Microsoft. Time and time again, we see a clear behavior from Google: that everything feeds the ad machine — or else!

As always, don't let facts get in the way of a good rant.

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#113

Post by joekrill »

richardwhiuk wrote: post #13

I've seen this been done before, and IME it's reasonable behavior. I've seen so many instances of computers configured with DNS servers which are extremely slow, or provide garbage results, that adding a known good DNS server to the list, and then parallel resolving across all of them is a perfectly legitimate thing to do.

OK but if that "known good" DNS server goes down or isn't available, you still have others you can fall back to. The device shouldn't just become completely useless. But that's what Google is doing here. It's their DNS servers or none, it seems.

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#114

Post by SmellyGeekBoy »

rmoriz wrote: post #69
mgoetzke wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how is it showing you ads ? Haven't seen any yet.

pi-hole also blocks tracking services. And I'm sure chromecast is full of tracking to enhance the value of your account.

Surely you'd know, right? As Pi-Hole logs all of this stuff.

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#115

Post by hannob »

Given that ISPs like to play with traffic and have been using censoring DNS servers again and again I can't blame Google for taking away one piece of potentially failing networking infrastructure and using their own.

It's not nice, but it's not Google who started this.

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#116

Post by adsadadsad »

SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #109
adsadadsad wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh and in the chromecast (non-ultra anyway), chromecast attempts to ignore any DNS servers supplied by your DHCP - hence why the watch-TV VPN's smartdns fails. Good luck rooting your Chromecast and chattr +i it's /etc/resolv.conf

How does a device "attempt to ignore" DNS servers supplied by DHCP? Like all devices connected to a network it must either use DHCP to get your DNS server or use a hardcoded value, it's not some kind of conspiracy.

"Attempt to ignore" Great question. So it uses hardcoded values of 8.8.8.8/8.8.4.4, unless it can't contact them by testing to resolve connectivity-test.google.com (or something like that), if it can't then it falls back to the DNS servers provided by your DHCP server/router. So to use smartdns with chromecast you have to both set your router to provide the SmartDNS servers and also blackhole 8.8.8.8/8.8.4.4 on your shitty ISP router (iirc static routes) - conspiracy? - i'll leave that to you? (the smartdns route is necessary since chromecast don't have their own VPN facility)

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#117

Post by ClashTheBunny »

hannob wrote: post #115

Given that ISPs like to play with traffic and have been using censoring DNS servers again and again I can't blame Google for taking away one piece of potentially failing networking infrastructure and using their own. It's not nice, but it's not Google who started this.

What happens when all DNS but the ISP's is blocked? I've been in many a corporate and cheapo Internet situation like this.

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#118

Post by joshstrange »

hannob wrote: post #115

Given that ISPs like to play with traffic and have been using censoring DNS servers again and again I can't blame Google for taking away one piece of potentially failing networking infrastructure and using their own. It's not nice, but it's not Google who started this.

You are missing the point, it's not that they first try 8.8.8.8 then falling back to ISP/defaults, they are requiring 8.8.8.8 for DNS which is BS.

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#119

Post by AdmiralAsshat »

Knowing who he is, my takeaway should be, "Wow! An Internet Hall of Famer weighing in against a Google product!"

But my actual takeaway is, "Legends of the CS world write informal, pithy rants to Google just like the rest of us mortals."

Re: My Chromecast Ultra would not start until I began answering 8.8.8.8

#120

Post by Legogris »

apostacy wrote: post #43
scrollaway wrote: post #14

I'm always shocked at how easy it is for people to fall into the "Google is evil!!1" trap on such trivial stuff (and funnily enough, much more serious privacy issues related to Google are ignored/downvoted). Hardcoded DNS servers are common. Extremely common in a bunch of IOT devices, given how broken some ISPs are. This is a non-story and the only reason it's being upvoted is because Google is doing it, and they als…

This isn't a case of an IOT device though. My Chromecast went through massive amount of trouble to use Google's DNS servers, to serve ads behind my pi-hole. It would respect all of my DHCP parameters, but silently ignore DNS settings. It was clearly intentional to serve ads. I had to set up a firewall to force it to use my DNS server. And eventually even that stopped working with an update (which themselves are reall…

Could you solve this by just routing 8.8.8.8 to your own DNS inside your network?
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