DNS Resolver-Based Data Storage and Retrieval System
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current systems for associating end-user data with network infrastructure components, such as DNS resolvers, face challenges in scalability and privacy concerns, requiring direct user interaction or specific information, which is inconvenient and potentially invasive.
Innovation Solution
A system utilizing an authoritative name server and multiple web servers to iteratively redirect user requests through a series of sub-domains, allowing general location association without specific user data, using standards-compliant web browsers and DNS resolvers for billing and fee-splitting purposes, scaling logarithmically with the number of resolvers and data points.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If services require end-users to perform self-identification processes to obtain location information, then the service can achieve more relevant and higher performing experience for end-users, but this creates direct inconvenience for end-users as they are actively involved in improving the service
Solution Approach 1:
The system automatically performs location identification without requiring user action. The DNS resolver automatically resolves domain names through the iterative subdomain process, and the service automatically receives location information without the user needing to manually enter or authorize it. The user's device and browser perform the identification process autonomously as part of normal service interaction.
2Loss of information
If services derive location information based on personally identifiable aspects like originating internet address, then the service can obtain location data, but the information is too specific to use directly and requires expensive mapping databases to generalize
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts only the necessary location information through the DNS resolver identification process, rather than capturing and processing complete IP address data. The iterative subdomain resolution extracts a condensed identifier (the DNS resolver) that contains the location information needed, eliminating the need to maintain large databases mapping all possible IP addresses to geographical regions.
Solution Approach 2:
The domain name is segmented into multiple subdomains in an iterative process, where each subdomain resolution step narrows down to identify the specific DNS resolver. This segmentation transforms a single complex identification problem (mapping IP to location) into a series of simpler steps that ultimately identify the DNS resolver as the location indicator.
3Object-affected harmful factors
If end-users obfuscate personally identifiable aspects by connecting through intermediaries like web proxies, then personal privacy is protected, but systems intended to derive generalized information are effectively defeated
Solution Approach 1:
The DNS resolver acts as an intermediary that naturally bridges the user and the service without requiring the user to directly expose personal information. The DNS resolver is already part of the network infrastructure that the user must use to access the service, so it provides location information indirectly through the domain resolution process rather than through direct user disclosure or IP address exposure.
4Measurement precision
If systems maintain high-frequency mapping databases to associate IP addresses with geographical regions, then accurate location results can be achieved, but the effort required to maintain accurate results is extremely high as information scales into larger datasets
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of maintaining a comprehensive database of all IP address to location mappings, the system uses the existing DNS resolver infrastructure as a copy or proxy for location information. The DNS resolver's domain name mappings already exist and are maintained by the DNS system itself, so the service can leverage this existing structure rather than creating and maintaining separate large-scale mapping databases.
Data Source
AI summary
System and method for associating general data with an end-user based on the domain name system (DNS) resolver that the end-user uses to map the canonical domain names of internet services to their associated network addresses. The present invention elegantly addresses concerns of scale regarding the key-space, for example the global number of distinct DNS resolvers, and the data-space, for example the number of distinct geographical areas to associate.