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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

#21

Post by crankylinuxuser »

For those running Linux machines for networking..

     sudo iptables -t nat -I OUTPUT --dst 8.8.8.8 -p tcp --dport 53 -j REDIRECT --to-ports 53
     sudo iptables -t nat -I OUTPUT --dst 8.8.4.4 -p tcp --dport 53 -j REDIRECT --to-ports 53
     sudo iptables -t nat -I OUTPUT --dst 8.8.8.8 -p udp --dport 53 -j REDIRECT --to-ports 53
     sudo iptables -t nat -I OUTPUT --dst 8.8.4.4 -p udp --dport 53 -j REDIRECT --to-ports 53
What that does, is catches requests coming in from the network going to Google's DNS, and redirects them to that local machine's port 53 (be it tcp or udp).

Its an ugly hack, but things like PiHoles can reliably do this with little to no extra load, and keep the google spy engine off your tracks. But then we'll have to discuss using a chrome..

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

#22

Post by megous »

jasonjayr wrote: post #12

I agree with the shadiness of this, but just to play devil's advocate here, is this to work around shitty ISP's that play games with DNS? Residential ISPs have not exactly been good faith actors in this game ...

Yes, but how does it help hardcoding one IP address that ISPs can simply route to their own DNS server?

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

#23

Post by dictum »

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 is unduly paternalistic: a story is whatever the HN community decides to pay attention to, even if that leaves out important stories or puts a spotlight on minor trivia.

> You know what would be an actual story though? If Google used Google DNS to spy on people. If anyone has concrete evidence that they're doing that, that is a big fucking deal.

I'm an optimist, but I'm also cynical enough to foresee the same complaints — it's not a story! everyone does it — if that came to pass.

Prevention is important because in real life you can almost never recoup the losses as easily. You can take it to the courts etc. but if your data leaks, it's out there, you can't undo it.

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

#24

Post by jon-wood »

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.

We hardcode known good DNS servers in IoT devices that we ship from work because a significant proportion of issues being reported by customers were caused by ISP resolvers doing things they shouldn't - mostly either redirecting all domains to a splash screen telling people about bandwidth quotas/other things, or not respecting the TTL returned by our resolvers, which could cause data to get directed to the wrong place for extended periods.

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

#25

Post by shawnz »

zamazingo wrote: post #16
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.

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.

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

#26

Post by tyingq »

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…

"I'm always shocked at how easy it is for people to fall into the "Google is evil!!1" trap on such trivial stuff"

Google's smart though. They know that rolling out unsavory ideas in small pieces keeps it under the radar.

They didn't, for example, push the organic search results under the fold all at once.

This could be innocuous, or part of some larger agenda.

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

#27

Post by sofaofthedamned »

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…

IIRC Meraki used to ping 8.8.8.8 as a connectivity check...

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

#28

Post by baptou12 »

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…

Other IOT manufacturers who hardcode the DNS into devices do not own the DNS servers, do they ?

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

#29

Post by sofaofthedamned »

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.

Not just Google - when you cast you handoff a URL to the CC to stream from - this could be from Netflix, or anywhere really. 8.8.8.8 as a brute-force backup I can understand, but by default it should be taking the network DHCP settings.

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

#30

Post by dictum »

tyingq wrote: post #26
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…

"I'm always shocked at how easy it is for people to fall into the "Google is evil!!1" trap on such trivial stuff" Google's smart though. They know that rolling out unsavory ideas in small pieces keeps it under the radar. They didn't, for example, push the organic search results under the fold all at once. This could be innocuous, or part of some larger agenda.

Irrespective of motivations/agenda, we can look at the current state of the consumer-facing Internet (the trend continues): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16421072
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