Today at around 1:30 p.m. (CEST), DENIC, the manager of the country-code TLD .de, noted that the .de DNS service partially sent out “NX”, i.e. “non-existent domain” responses for parts of its overall domain inventory, although the relevant domains are actually existing. As a result, using this service the pertinent domains could no longer be accessed.

Right after detecting the problem, DENIC set up its incident response team that deactivated those servers from the redundant service infrastructure which may give faulty answers. At around 3 p.m. (CEST) the latter servers were consecutively restored, leading to full system operability at around 3:45 p.m. (CEST).

Irregularities may possibly still be faced by internet users even beyond the 3:45 p.m. (CEST) bug fixing time, as Internet Service Providers commonly use DNS caching for intermediate data storage, which may persist for an anticipated period of some two hours following completed troubleshooting.

DENIC, while expressing regret for this incident, herewith announce that in the meantime, the bug was being identified and fixed. Further details will be notified following further analysis.

Background information

About DENIC eG

As the central registry, DENIC administers the now more than 13 million domains under the Top Level Domain .de and thus provides a crucial resource for users of the Internet. It sees its role as that of a competent, impartial provider of services for all domain holders and Internet users. With more than 116 employees, DENIC creates the foundation through its work for German Internet pages and e-mail addresses to be accessible throughout the world. The about 270 members of the Cooperative are IT or telecommunications businesses based in Germany and elsewhere. Working in cooperation with them and other partners, DENIC is committed to guarantee the secure operation of the Internet and its further worldwide development as a not-for-profit organization.

It operates the automatic electronic registration system for its members, runs the domain database for the Top Level Domain .de and the German ENUM domain (.9.4.e164.arpa), manages the name server services for the .de zone at currently 16 locations distributed throughout the world, and renders a considerable contribution to the further organizational and technical development of the Internet in cooperation with international bodies (e.g. ICANN, CENTR, IETF).

For further information please contact:

Public Relations
Fon: +49 69 27235-274
E-Mail: mailto:presse@denic.de