Lying DNS: Internet censorship for everyone in France?
On May 13, 2023, French Internet users were surprised to discover an astonishing redirection of their Telegram links. A Home Office sign appears announcing that the visitor attempted to connect to a child pornography site. In question, a redirection set up by French ISPs (Internet Service Providers), at the request of the government.
Lying DNS and tracking
The method used is called liar DNS. DNS (Domain Name System) is the service that displays a site by translating a domain name into an IP address. The system that replaces the response IP is therefore called the liar DNS. In our case, the ISPs had to replace the Telegram reply IP with a Ministry page.
If you use Telegram and subscribe to a major public ISP, chances are you came across this page this morning:
How is it possible ? A popularized mini threadhttps://t.co/eRypNYARZZ— Cecile (@AtaxyaNetwork) May 13, 2023
In a few hours, the blockage is lifted. On the side of the police, at the origin of the request for redirection, it is explained that a human error led to a total blocking of Telegram, where only a few specific URLs were to be concerned. Bonus track: several Internet users have denounced the presence of a Flag on the redirect page. In other words, each visitor is registered and tagged as soon as they arrive.
Well, the Ministry of the Interior had promised us that there would be no tracking on DNS blocking pages. They added more when we had our backs turned.
Lies and incompetence as the only way to move forward. https://t.co/SOatiy1ylN— Solarus 🟡 (@Solarus0) May 13, 2023
A situation that raises a question
This whole story raises a number of questions. At the forefront is, logically, that of net neutrality and the protection of privacy online. If all these measures start from an implacable logic, namely to prevent dangerous and illegal content, their implementation seems to take a more than unpredictable path.
But Web players are also worried about a real problem of technical knowledge on the part of public authorities. While a bill currently in preparation will simplify the blocking of sites, some technicians and operators are reporting an ubiquitous situation. Poor quality impact study, poor understanding of the technical limits of the lying DNS, poor consideration of the ISPs’ ability to act…
For critics of the bill, the examples are legion to prove the lack of preparation of the authorities on the issue. The hiccup this weekend, which led to the complete blocking of Telegram, also seems to confirm this feeling of sloppy work.
