As phishing attacks growing continuously, it’s difficult for users to identify a fake website from a real one. But it’s not hard for DNS to do so. Having a concern about it, IBM security in collaboration with the Global Cyber Alliance and the Packet Clearing House has launched a new free DNS service called Quad9. It helps users enjoy Internet use with fewer security risks.
Quad9 basically referred to IP address 9.9.9.9. It uses threat intelligence from IBM’s X-Force Threat Intelligence database, along with 18 other threat intelligence agencies, to compile a thorough blacklist of websites. This will ensure a fast response time to new threats—when one partner agency recognizes a bad actor, it can be blocked by Quad9 immediately.
At whatever point a client endeavors to explore to a site that is known to contain pernicious code, Quad9 will block it.
Sean Michael Kerner, eWeek said, “DNS is a foundational element of internet infrastructure, matching IP addresses with domain names. The Packet Clearing House is providing the network infrastructure for Quad9. It provides the network on which Quad9’s packets travel.”
DNS servers work by translating website address into text-based domain names, that is handled by various corporations. Those corporations generally keep track on consumer visits and store their information including their device, location for a purpose.
In contrast, with Quad9, user don’t need to worry about their information. As IBM noted, it is engineered to not store, correlate or otherwise leverage any personally identifiable information (PII) from its users.
Phil Rettinger, GCA president, and chief operating officer said, “The service is to be privacy sensitive, with no logging of addresses making DNS request. Only geolocation data is kept in order to track the spread of requests associated with particular malicious domains. “We’re anonymizing the data, sacrificing on the side of privacy.”
It is designed to protect IoT devices as well. This will add an additional layer of security to IoT devices, which consumers have generally had a hard time configuring and securing.
It will work by using threat intelligence from IBM’s X-Force Threat Intelligence database, along with 18 other threat intelligence agencies, to compile a thorough blacklist of websites. Means, Whenever a Quad9 user clicks on a website link or types in an address into a web browser, Quad9 will check the site against the IBM X-Force threat intelligence database of over 40 billion analyzed web pages and images.
Quad9 also taps feeds from 18 additional threat intelligence partners to block a large portion of the threats that present risk to end users and businesses alike.
Sean Gallagher in Ars Technica said, “Trying to navigate to a website known to contain malicious code? They have you covered. Quad9 will block it and it won’t return name resolutions for sites that are identified via threat feeds the service aggregates daily.”
Wherever you are, it is very easy to setup Quad9 with four steps only. Steps for macOS and Windows machines can be found on the Quad9 website.