[2]
By Brian Tankersley - For K2 Enterprises and Accountingweb.com

There's a big hole on the internet related to a problem with (See this article [3]), the drones that silently and efficiently convert internet addresses like www.bftcpa.com [4] and bftcpa@gmail.com [5] into IP addresses like 65.254.254.34 and 209.85.171.83. You may also want to listen [6] to the Security Now podcast here, or review the printable transcript [7] of the episode here. You may want to use one of the three tools listed below to test your ISP's DNS servers to see if they are patched for the vulnerability:

• Dan Kaminsky's DoxPara Site [8]
• The DNS Operations, Analysis and Research Center Testing Tool [9]
• The very nice DNS Stuff site offers their own tool [10]

If your ISP is vulnerable, you might consider using someone else's DNS servers. Some options include:

• OpenDNS [11] is a free service (Wikipedia article here [12]) which lets you use their DNS servers (208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220) instead of your ISP's servers. (Open DNS is reportedly not vulnerable to the attacks mentioned in the podcast.) An article [13] on how to configure Windows XP, Windows Vista, and a router from Computerworld is here [14]. I have been using OpenDNS for about six months, and have been impressed with the speed increases when browsing the web,
• Other options, including talking directly to the 13 root servers and others are in an article from Leo Notenbloom here [15].