The NSA Wants Businesses To Use DoH. Here's What You Need To Know.

By Justine Kurtz, Webroot

Most people would categorically agree that increased privacy online is a good thing. But in practice, questions of privacy online are a bit more complex. In recent months, you’ve likely heard about DNS over HTTPS, also known as DNS 2.0 and DoH, which is a method that uses the HTTPS protocol to encrypt DNS requests, shielding their contents from malicious actors and others who might misuse such information. It can even address several DNS-enabled cyberattack methods, such as DNS spoofing or hijacking. On the other hand, obfuscating the content of DNS requests can also reduce admins’ visibility and control, as well as negatively affect business network security.

Ultimately, this DNS privacy upgrade has been a long time coming. While its creators’ original 1983 design has undoubtedly proven itself by scaling to meet the demands of today’s internet, privacy just wasn’t a consideration 38 years ago; thus, the need for DoH.

“Privacy just wasn’t a consideration 38 years ago; thus, the need for DoH.”

When weighing the obvious privacy and security benefits against the visibility and potential security drawbacks, some businesses are having difficulty managing these new protocols. That’s likely why the NSA recently released a guide that not only explains the need for DoH, it strongly recommends that businesses protect their networks from rogue DNS sources to improve their network security. But what their guide doesn’t really focus on is how.