[AusNOG] Telstra redirecting failed DNS lookups

[Kim Davies]

Quoting Tom Wright on Friday November 20, 2009:
| http://www.crn.com.au/News/160923,bigpond-redirects-typos-to-unethical-branded-search-page.aspx

Aside from the distaste of the concept in general, BigPond is quoted as
saying:

   "BigPond Broadband customers from today will experience less keyboard
   anguish with our new DNS redirection application. Typos can happen
   at any time. It's frustrating when you get an MS Internet Explorer
   Live Search page with suggestions from a mistyped URL. It's even more
   annoying when you get an unfriendly "404" page error message," the
   letter said.

   "The BigPond-branded landing page provides BigPond customers with
   organic search results, sponsored links, display advertisements and
   intelligent recommendations, all derived from the invalid domain input -
   much more helpful and friendly than a nasty 404 page error."

When would you ever get a 404 error for a non-existent domain? If they
are doing NXDOMAIN redirection it will stop exactly zero 404 errors
appearing for BigPond customers.

kim