TI-DNS: A Trusted and Incentive DNS Resolution Architecture based on Blockchain

Yufan Fu, Jiuqi Wei, Ying Li, Botao Peng, Xiaodong Li

Abstract: Domain Name System (DNS) is a critical component of the Internet infrastructure, responsible for translating domain names into IP addresses. However, DNS is vulnerable to some malicious attacks, including DNS cache poisoning, which redirects users to malicious websites displaying offensive or illegal content. Existing countermeasures often suffer from at least one of the following weakness: weak attack resistance, high overhead, or complex implementation. To address these challenges, this paper presents TI-DNS, a blockchain-based DNS resolution architecture designed to detect and correct the forged DNS records caused by the cache poisoning attacks in the DNS resolution process. TI-DNS leverages a multi-resolver Query Vote mechanism to ensure the credibility of verified records on the blockchain ledger and a stake-based incentive mechanism to promote well-behaved participation. Importantly, TI-DNS is easy to be adopted as it only requires modifications to the resolver side of current DNS infrastructure. Finally, we develop a prototype and evaluate it against alternative solutions. The result demonstrates that TI-DNS effectively and efficiently solves DNS cache poisoning.