CZ.NIC Secures Czech Internet

On Tuesday, September 30 at 9 AM CZ.NIC employees have rolled out the DNSSEC technology.

Prague, September 30, 2008 – After six months of testing CZ.NIC association has rolled out DNSSEC. This technology is able to prevent hidden attacks, which take advantage of a security gap in the DNS system. These attacks are a potential danger for almost all services on the Internet, especially online banking or internet news reporting. CZ.NIC cooperates with the server Lidovky.cz on launching this technology; Lidovky.cz is the first Czech online medium with its domain protected in this way. The Czech Republic has thus joined five countries of the world, which protect their domains by means of the DNSSEC technology.
DNS system is one of the technical pillars of the Internet. Thanks to this system, the user does not need to remember numerical addresses of various servers, but needs only to remember their "names" such as www.dobradomena.cz. The gap in the security of the DNS system makes it possible for the attacker to forge any numerical address of any domain name and thus redirect the user to a forged web page or intercept his e-mails.
“Recently evidence has been disclosed in the internet community proving that it is possible to carry out a similar attack in a matter of seconds. Subsequent measures rapidly decreased the probability of such attack, however with the required equipment in the price range not exceeding several thousand Czech Crowns, it is still possible, under ideal conditions, to carry out a successful attack in a matter of hours. The Implementation of DNSSEC is one of few measures providing protection from this type of attack,” stated Ondřej Surý, technical director of CZ.NIC association.
However, the actual launch of DNSSEC in the Czech domain registry does not provide a 100% protection. Now it is important for all relevant internet entities to implement DNSSEC onto their servers. "The priority is to implement DNSSEC at internet access providers. Registrars and various web service providers, for example banks or media should immediately follow. Only then the protection will be truly efficient. The users themselves can also protect their computers. The instructions are available on the web at http://podpora.nic.cz/Jak_zprovoznit_DNSSEC,“ added Ondřej Filip, Executive Director of CZ.NIC association.
The news server Lidovky.cz participated together with CZ.NIC in both DNSSEC testing and its launch. “Online media are one of the potential targets of DNS attacks. Faking the content of economic or political information can have negative impact at minimum on the reputation and credibility of the given media; with potential adverse effects on the society as a whole. Therefore we decided to cooperate with CZ.NIC and have DNSSEC implemented at Lidovky.cz. Our readers thus rest assured, that information on Lidovky.cz web pages is not forged," concluded Jaroslav Červený, IT Department Director of the media group MAFRA.