

IETF DNSOP Working Group                                    Y. Morishita
Internet-Draft                                                      JPRS
Expires: July 11, 2004                                         T. Jinmei
                                                                 Toshiba
                                                        January 11, 2004


       Common Misbehavior against DNS Queries for IPv6 Addresses
            draft-ietf-dnsop-misbehavior-against-aaaa-00.txt

Status of this Memo

   This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with
   all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
   Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups. Note that other
   groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts.

   Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
   and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
   time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
   material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

   The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at http://
   www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt.

   The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at
   http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html.

   This Internet-Draft will expire on July 11, 2004.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004). All Rights Reserved.

Abstract

   There is some known misbehavior of DNS authoritative servers when
   they are queried for AAAA resource records. Such behavior can block
   IPv4 communication which should actually be available, cause a
   significant delay in name resolution, or even make a denial of
   service attack. This memo describes details of the known cases and
   discusses the effect of the cases.

1. Introduction

   Many DNS clients (resolvers) that support IPv6 first search for AAAA
   Resource Records (RRs) of a target host name, and then for A RRs of



Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 1]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


   the same name. This fallback mechanism is based on the DNS
   specifications, which if not obeyed by authoritative servers can
   produce unpleasant results. In some cases, for example, a web browser
   fails to connect to a web server it could otherwise. In the following
   sections, this memo describes some typical cases of the misbehavior
   and its (bad) effects.

   Note that the misbehavior is not specific to AAAA RRs. In fact, all
   known examples also apply to the cases of queries for MX, NS, and SOA
   RRs. The authors even believe this can be generalized for all types
   of queries other than those for A RRs. In this memo, however, we
   concentrate on the case for AAAA queries, since the problem is
   particularly severe for resolvers that support IPv6, which thus
   affects many end users. Resolvers at end users normally send A and/or
   AAAA queries only, and so the problem for the other cases is
   relatively minor.

2. Network Model

   In this memo, we assume a typical network model of name resolution
   environment using DNS. It consists of three components; stub
   resolvers, caching servers, and authoritative servers. A stub
   resolver issues a recursive query to a caching server, which then
   handles the entire name resolution procedure recursively. The caching
   server caches the result of the query as well as sends the result to
   the stub resolver. The authoritative servers respond to queries for
   names for which they have the authority, normally in a non-recursive
   manner.

3. Expected Behavior

   Suppose that an authoritative server has an A RR but not a AAAA RR
   for a host name. Then the server should return a response to a query
   for a AAAA RR of the name with the RCODE being 0 (indicating no
   error) and with an empty answer section [1]. Such a response
   indicates that there is at least one RR of a different type than AAAA
   for the queried name, and the stub resolver can then look for A RRs.

   This way, the caching server can cache the fact that the queried name
   does not have a AAAA RR (but may have other types of RRs), and thus
   can improve the response time to further queries for a AAAA RR of the
   name.

4. Problematic Behaviors

   There are some known cases at authoritative servers that do not
   conform to the expected behavior. This section describes those
   problematic cases.



Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 2]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


4.1 Return NXDOMAIN

   This type of server returns a response with the RCODE being 3
   (NXDOMAIN) to a query for a AAAA RR, indicating it does not have any
   RRs of any type for the queried name.

   With this response, the stub resolver may immediately give up and
   never fall back. Even if the resolver retries with a query for an A
   RR, the negative response for the name has been cached in the caching
   server, and the caching server will simply return the negative
   response. As a result, the stub resolver considers this as a fatal
   error in name resolution.

   There have been several known examples of this behavior, but all the
   examples that the authors know have changed their behavior as of this
   writing.

4.2 Return NOTIMP

   Other authoritative servers return a response with the RCODE being 4
   (NOTIMP), indicating the servers do not support the requested type of
   query.

   This case is less harmful than the previous one; if the stub resolver
   falls back to querying for an A RR, the caching server will process
   the query correctly and return an appropriate response.

   In this case, the caching server does not cache the fact that the
   queried name has no AAAA RR, resulting in redundant queries for AAAA
   RRs in the future. The behavior will waste network bandwidth and
   increase the load of the authoritative server.

   Using SERVFAIL or FORMERR would cause the same effect, though the
   authors have not seen such implementations yet.

4.3 Return a Broken Response

   Another different type of authoritative servers returns broken
   responses to AAAA queries. A known behavior of this category is to
   return a response whose RR type is AAAA, but the length of the RDATA
   is 4 bytes. The 4-byte data looks like the IPv4 address of the
   queried host name. That is, the RR in the answer section would be
   described like this:

     www.bad.example. 600 IN AAAA 192.0.2.1

   which is, of course, bogus (or at least meaningless).




Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 3]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


   A widely deployed caching server implementation transparently returns
   the broken response (as well as caches it) to the stub resolver.
   Another known server implementation parses the response by
   themselves, and sends a separate response with the RCODE being 2
   (SERVFAIL).

   In either case, the broken response does not affect queries for an A
   RR of the same name. If the stub resolver falls back to A queries, it
   will get an appropriate response.

   The latter case, however, causes the same bad effect as that
   described in the previous section: redundant queries for AAAA RRs.

4.4 Make Lame Delegation

   Some authoritative servers respond to AAAA queries in a way causing
   lame delegation. In this case the parent zone specifies that the
   authoritative server should have the authority of a zone, but the
   server does not return an authoritative response for AAAA queries
   within the zone (i.e., the AA bit in the response is not set). On the
   other hand, the authoritative server returns an authoritative
   response for A queries.

   When a caching server asks the server for AAAA RRs in the zone, it
   recognizes the delegation is lame, and return a response with the
   RCODE being 2 (SERVFAIL) to the stub resolver.

   Furthermore, some caching servers record the authoritative server as
   lame for the zone and will not use it for a certain period of time.
   With this type of caching server, even if the stub resolver falls
   back to querying for an A RR, the caching server will simply return a
   response with the RCODE being SERVFAIL, since all the servers are
   known to be "lame."

   There is also an implementation that relaxes the behavior a little
   bit. It basically tries to avoid using the lame server, but still
   continues to try it as a last resort. With this type of caching
   server, the stub resolver will get a correct response if it falls
   back after SERVFAIL. However, this still causes redundant AAAA
   queries as explained in the previous sections.

4.5 Ignore Queries for AAAA

   Some authoritative severs seem to ignore queries for a AAAA RR,
   causing a delay at the stub resolver to fall back to a query for an A
   RR. This behavior may even cause a fatal timeout at the resolver.





Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 4]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


5. Security Considerations

   The CERT/CC pointed out that the response with NXDOMAIN described in
   Section 4.1 can be used for a denial of service attack [2]. The same
   argument applies to the case of "lame delegation" described in
   Section 4.4 with a certain type of caching server.

6. Acknowledgements

   Erik Nordmark encouraged the authors to publish this document as an
   Internet Draft. Akira Kato and Paul Vixie reviewed a preliminary
   version of this document. Pekka Savola carefully reviewed a previous
   version and provided detailed comments.

Informative References

   [1]  Mockapetris, P., "DOMAIN NAMES - CONCEPTS AND FACILITIES", RFC
        1034, November 1987.

   [2]  The CERT Coordination Center, "Incorrect NXDOMAIN responses from
        AAAA queries could cause denial-of-service conditions", March
        2003, <http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/714121>.


Authors' Addresses

   MORISHITA Orange Yasuhiro
   Research and Development Department, Japan Registry Service Co.,Ltd.
   Fuundo Bldg 3F, 1-2 Kanda-Ogawamachi
   Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo  101-0052
   Japan

   EMail: yasuhiro@jprs.co.jp


   JINMEI Tatuya
   Corporate Research & Development Center, Toshiba Corporation
   1 Komukai Toshiba-cho, Saiwai-ku
   Kawasaki-shi, Kanagawa  212-8582
   Japan

   EMail: jinmei@isl.rdc.toshiba.co.jp

Appendix A. Live Examples

   In this appendix, we show concrete implementations and domain names
   that may cause problematic cases so that the behavior can be
   reproduced in a practical environment. The examples are for



Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 5]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


   informational purposes only, and the authors do not intend to accuse
   any implementations or zone administrators.

   The behavior described in Section 4.2 (return NOTIMP) can be found by
   looking for a AAAA RR of www.css.vtext.com at 66.174.3.4.

   The behavior described in Section 4.3 (broken responses) can be seen
   by querying for a AAAA RR of "www.gslb.mainichi.co.jp," which is an
   alias of "www.mainichi.co.jp," at 210.173.172.2. The same behavior
   can be found with the name "vip.alt.ihp.sony.co.jp," an alias of
   "www.sony.co.jp," at 210.139.255.204.

   The behavior described in Section 4.4 (lame delegation) can be found
   by querying for a AAAA RR of "www.ual.com" at 209.87.113.4.

   The behavior described in Section 4.5 (ignore queries) can be seen by
   trying to ask for a AAAA RR of "ad.3jp.doubleclick.net," which is an
   alias of "ad.jp.doubleclick.net," at 210.153.90.9.

   Many authoritative server implementations show the expected behavior
   described in Section 3. Some DNS load balancers reportedly have a
   problematic behavior shown in Section 4, but the authors do not have
   a concrete example. The CERT/CC provides a list of implementations
   that behave as described in Section 4.1 [2].

   The BIND9 caching server implementation is an example of the latter
   cases described in Section 4.3 and Section 4.4, respectively. The
   BIND8 caching server implementation is an example of the former case
   described in Section 4.3. As for the issue shown in Section 4.4,
   BIND8 caching servers prior to 8.3.5 show the behavior described as
   the former case in this section. The versions 8.3.5 and later of
   BIND8 caching server behave like the BIND9 caching server
   implementation with this matter.

   Regarding resolver implementations, the authors are only familiar
   with the ones derived from the BIND implementation. These
   implementations always fall back regardless of the RCODE; NXDOMAIN,
   NOTIMP, or SERVFAIL. It even falls back when getting a broken
   response. However, the behavior does not help the situation in the
   NXDOMAIN case (see Section 4.1). Lame delegation (Section 4.4) also
   causes a fatal error at the resolver side if the resolver is using
   some older versions of BIND8 caching server.

   The authors hear that a stub resolver routine implemented in some web
   browsers interprets the broken response described in Section 4.3 as a
   fatal error and does not fall back to A queries. However, we have not
   confirmed this information.




Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 6]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


Appendix B. Change History

   Changes since draft-morishita-dnsop-misbehavior-against-aaaa-00 are:

   o  Made a separate appendix and moved live examples to appendix so
      that we can remove them when this document is (ever) officially
      published.

   o  Revised some live examples based on the recent status.

   o  Noted in introduction that the misbehavior is not specific to AAAA
      and that this document still concentrates on the AAAA case.

   o  Changed the section title of "delegation loop" to "lame
      delegation" in order to reflect the essential point of the issue.
      Wording on this matter was updated accordingly.

   o  Updated the Acknowledgements list.

   o  Changed the reference category from normative to informative (this
      is an informational document after all).

   o  Changed the draft name to an IETF dnsop working group document (as
      agreed).

   o  Applied several editorial fixes.

























Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 7]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


Intellectual Property Statement

   The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any
   intellectual property or other rights that might be claimed to
   pertain to the implementation or use of the technology described in
   this document or the extent to which any license under such rights
   might or might not be available; neither does it represent that it
   has made any effort to identify any such rights. Information on the
   IETF's procedures with respect to rights in standards-track and
   standards-related documentation can be found in BCP-11. Copies of
   claims of rights made available for publication and any assurances of
   licenses to be made available, or the result of an attempt made to
   obtain a general license or permission for the use of such
   proprietary rights by implementors or users of this specification can
   be obtained from the IETF Secretariat.

   The IETF invites any interested party to bring to its attention any
   copyrights, patents or patent applications, or other proprietary
   rights which may cover technology that may be required to practice
   this standard. Please address the information to the IETF Executive
   Director.


Full Copyright Statement

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004). All Rights Reserved.

   This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
   others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
   or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published
   and distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any
   kind, provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
   included on all such copies and derivative works. However, this
   document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
   the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
   Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of
   developing Internet standards in which case the procedures for
   copyrights defined in the Internet Standards process must be
   followed, or as required to translate it into languages other than
   English.

   The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
   revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assignees.

   This document and the information contained herein is provided on an
   "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING
   TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING
   BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION



Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 8]

Internet-Draft    Common Misbehavior against AAAA Queries   January 2004


   HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
   MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.


Acknowledgement

   Funding for the RFC Editor function is currently provided by the
   Internet Society.











































Morishita & Jinmei       Expires July 11, 2004                  [Page 9]


