DNS changes to take minutes

July 2004

VeriSign is to rapidly update Domain Name System (DNS) records every few minutes instead of only twice a day. From 8 September changes in the .com and .net zones will take an estimated five minutes to propagate across all 13 .com/.net authoritative name servers. The old systems will remain there for those who don't want to make the leap forward.

The biggest benefit of the change will be to do away with the need to wait hours for change in a domain to become visible on the Net. VeriSign has successfully tested the changes, which involve an update to its proprietary authoritative name server (ATLAS) technology, over recent months. It reckons the changes are now ready for prime time.