Can we finally expect ICANN’s overthrow by a decentralized, blockchain-based DNS ecosystem?
The era of Internet suppression is now omnipresent. What once used to be openly available and transparent has now been fully regulated and censorship-tolerant by government officials. The control was merged in the hands of online conglomerates such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google. As they aim to stay within the regulatory borders, they misemploy our freedoms and privacy for their personal gain.
Besides censorship, conglomerates are now monitoring vast amounts of personal data. Colossal data breaches incorporate 1 billion accounts from Yahoo! in December 2016, 145 million records from Equifax in December 2017 and 110 million records from Target in November of 2013 are repeatedly arising. The public is becoming aware that they need to have greater control of their data, which means the need for a new, more decentralized and anonymous internet is called-for. The existing infrastructure was not designed to allow for this. We believe that the decentralized web name system is a necessary starting point to fill this void. People need to be able to find resources within the new decentralized internet that is forming, and they will demand that the naming system remains decentralized.
ICANN has been raining censorship and opacity down on us — thereby being solely responsible for delegating Top-Level Domains such as .com, .net, .org etc. extensions to name a few. The global domain name registrars GoDaddy, Bluehost, Hostgator, Namecheap and others have had a firm grip on domain names.
However, the suitable permutation of blockchain tech and P2P networks can produce a system parallel to ICANN without the capricious control and fallacies of humankind. It can be fault-tolerant and censorship-resistant.
Zooko’s famous triangle and corresponding Blockchain benefits
Zooko Wilcox-O’Hearn famously projected that three essential attributes must constitute a naming protocol for it to be classified as innovative and multifaceted. This evaluation technique has been used to estimate where a system stands on the progression path towards a picture-perfect naming system.
1) Human-meaningful: the name provided to users should be meaningful and easy to remember and write without errors.
2) Secure: a name can only be resolved to one, unique and correct entity, even in the presence of untrusted nodes.
3) Decentralized: no central authority in the system and untrusted nodes are probably present.
In terms of Zooko’s Triangle theory, blockchain-powered DNS systems possess all three attributes. They fall heir to most virtues of Distributed Ledger Technologies as the underlying blockchain tech is decentralized by design.
Dissimilar to the existing DNS which is governed and managed by organizations, no institutions in blockchain-centric DNS can seize the power. Only the DNS proprietors can make modifications to present records with their private key. It is next to impossible for authorities to dictate any changes to the domain name records.
As far as security is at stake, blockchain-based DNS has palpable benefits as well. DNS as we know it is susceptible to a range of mishaps due to protocol weaknesses. Even with the enrichment of ICANN, the technology still cannot avert robust DDoS attacks. In contrast, as all domain names are locally stored on every node, there is no need for the client to query the names by interacting with remote servers. Therefore, all lets-exploit-the-middleman attacks existing within traditional DNS no longer pose a threat in blockchain-based DNS.
What is even more, DNS system presently doesn’t encrypt data, meaning that sensible information can be easily misemployed by online eavesdroppers.
Butterfly’s metamorphosis of DNS into its decentralized counterpart
Through Blockchain-fueled DNS, the registry operators will have enhanced freedom and will be empowered to initiate new, censorship-resilient TLDs. They can also tailor the newly created TLDs to a specific niche. For example, in a web name of “nfl.fantasy.sports”, “nfl” is a subdomain of “fantasy”, which is, in turn, a subdomain of the top level “sports” domain. This is specifically why traditional DNS servers must undergo a metamorphosis to be born into a Butterfly protocol. The “nfl.fantasy.sports” domain name can exist with current DNS, however “nfl” would have to be owned by the same entity that owns “fantasy.sports”, and that is a big differentiator for Butterfly. As there can be many separate parties that have tokens for “fantasy.sports”, therefore many different owners of subdomains of fantasy.sports are existent.
Butterfly’s sole purpose is to begin a new age in Domain Name creation and ownership, using blockchain technology as its spearhead, battling for the creation of decentralized internet future for all of its users. It is undeniable that presently DNS system are going through a development predicament, whereas the blockchain substitutes allows for reshaping an entire industry by delivering solutions to the inefficiencies that presently hinder this area.. Butterfly offers ingenious solutions to them to achieve that goal.
Besides, with Butterfly the system tolerates highly-adaptable domain names and extensions. As per the previous example, users would be incentivized to attain “identity.sports”, thereby empowering them to showcase their own individual brand most precisely. This feature has been put into motion as Butterfly’s proprietary DNS along with an auxiliary Governance Smart Contract. Butterfly’s users will also reap the liberties of being able to use all kinds of symbols in domain names that they create (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Khmer, Indian, etc), even including emoji icons for very distinguished domain names.
With Butterfly, sponsoring a new domain creation will be powered by a native token. This feature eradicates any government interference and also counters domain parking.
Ultimately, the unique feature all privacy advocates will find astounding is Butterfly’s global identification. The moment a user acquires a FQN (Fully-Qualified Name — eg. John.Doe.ID), full control over social media accounts, cryptocurrency wallets, and everything associated with the given identity will be credited to the given FQN. Using this feature, users will be able to record wallet addresses in the domain, support different digital currencies, and allow transfers via easily-comprehensible FQNs instead of confusing wallet address symbol combinations.
Conclusion
Butterfly is here to bring the future of Internet domain name creation, acquisition and ownership — one with a decentralized nature, where individuals and enterprises are able to select their perfect and exactly-matching domain name, to signify their identity, thanks to blockchain technology.
While decentralized domain naming systems have been developing for a while, only a few match and address the industry’s challenges as thoroughly as Butterfly. Users own their domain names outright without any renewal costs, and the platform employs a web-browsing extension to counter censorship and content blocking.
