By Kieran Waters
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Cloudflare, a big cloud network platform, has just recently launched a mobile app to make it even easier to access their 1.1.1.1 DNS for those using either android or iOS mobile platforms.
Cloudflare originally started up back in 2009, and has had a relatively short life for an internet company, but has grown to be one of the biggest players in the DNS world, and they now advertise themselves as a whole Content Delivery Network solution, which in a nutshell makes everything easier for everyone on the internet, and they quickly gained a reputation for being very reliable and privacy-focused.
DNS solutions, or Domain Name Server’s to give them their full name, basically sit in between hosting services (i.e. the people that publish the website and host it on servers, think Weebly, GoDaddy, Wix) and the end user who is trying to access any particular website. If you’ve ever gone into networking or the internet, you’ll have probably seen an IP address around (often something like 192.168.1.xx), as these are basically what are needed to send data around from device to device using IP or Internet Protocol. This is important because when you enter a URL in the address bar of your browser, the browser doesn't actually go straight to that website because your browser first needs to find the IP address of the server the website is being hosted on and connect to the server before the website can be loaded.
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This is where DNS’s come in as they are basically an online resource which relates every URL address to a corresponding IP address. So when say you type in Google.com in your address bar, the browser will actually contact the preferred DNS (usually selected in your preferences) to first find the corresponding IP address of the closest server on which Google.com is being hosted. The browser will then connect to the hosting server and make a request to see the page relating to Google.com (many different websites can be hosted on a single server). The best way to summarize this is to think that DNS’s are the internet's phone books.
There are many different DNS’s that you can choose from, usually by default your Internet Service Provider will select a default one for you to use, however it is often very simple to change on Windows or MacOS systems, but Google has 8.8.8.8, and others like Norton and Cisco also have their own DNS’s as well. The special thing about Cloudflare’s 1.1.1.1 service is that it has been proven in tests to be upto 28% faster than other services, ultimately meaning web pages load faster, and they have pledged not to store users IP address or log any traffic (something many other DNS’s do) meaning more privacy for the end user.
It may seem a bit daunting to have to go into your network settings on your mobile phone, and it will probably feel wrong to change any settings the first time you do it (some companies like Apple don't even let you change the default DNS for Cellular connections) but with the release of Cloudflare’s 1.1.1.1 app this is all made as easy as a flick of a switch, instantly speeding up your connection and adding extra privacy. The app can be downloaded from the Google Play Store, and the Apple App Store. Welcome to the world of personal data being the true currency of the Internet!
For more information visit 1.1.1.1
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