Managed DNS Services

In today’s fast-paced and globalized world, many companies choose to outsource their customer support to foreign countries. However, at No-IP, we believe that providing exceptional customer support is a key factor in building strong and long-lasting relationships with our users. That’s why we’ve made the strategic decision to keep our Customer Support team in-house at our local Reno, Nevada office.

Our Reno-based team of support technicians is made up of experienced professionals who are passionate about helping our users solve their networking problems. They undergo rigorous training and are well-versed in all aspects of No-IP’s products and services. This means that our users can trust that they are speaking with a knowledgeable support technician who is dedicated to helping them find the right solution to their problem.

In addition to their technical expertise, our Customer Support staff is also dedicated to providing personalized and friendly service to our users. They understand that networking issues can be frustrating and overwhelming, and they work hard to put our users at ease and guide them through the troubleshooting process in a patient and empathetic manner.

One of the key advantages of having our Customer Support team based in our local Reno office is that we are able to work closely with our product development team to provide valuable feedback and suggestions based on our users’ experiences. This helps us to continuously improve our products and services and ensures that our users receive the best possible support experience.

Another benefit of having a US-based Customer Support team is the ability to provide fast response times. Our users can expect to receive a response from our Customer Support team within 24 hours, which is a breath of fresh air when you think about times when you reach out to bigger tech companies and are lucky if you even get a response from a human being within the week.

At No-IP, we’re proud to say that our commitment to providing exceptional customer support has paid off. In fact, we have some impressive statistics to back it up:

• Our average response time is less than 4 hours, which means that our users can get help quickly and efficiently.
• Over 91% of our users rate their experience with our Customer Support team as “excellent” or “good”, which demonstrates the high level of satisfaction that our users have with our support.
• Our team resolves over 66% of support inquiries on the first contact, which means that our users can get back to managing their IP networks with minimal downtime.

By having our Customer Support team in-house, we are also able to ensure that our support staff is familiar with all aspects of our products and services. This means that they are able to provide comprehensive and accurate support to our users, regardless of their issues or question. Whether it’s troubleshooting device connection issues, configuring DDNS settings, or changing the domain covered by Plus Managed DNS, our Customer Support team has the knowledge and experience to help our users find the right solution.

While our Customer Support team provides the utmost care to all our users, we still offer a Priority Support service that provides access to the following:

• Higher priority – The tickets you submit are instantly flagged and moved to the top of the Customer Support queue.
• Exclusive toll-free support number – No more waiting on hold!
• Weekend phone support – your IP network never takes a break, so should anything happen during non-business hours or if you have any questions that you need to talk out with another human, there is someone available and happy to help.

Overall, having a US-based Customer Support team is just one of the ways that No-IP prioritizes our users’ needs. By keeping our support staff in-house, we are able to provide personalized, knowledgeable, and friendly support that is tailored to our users’ specific needs. Our commitment to exceptional customer support is evident in the dedication of our Customer Support staff, the fast response times that we provide, and the high level of quality control that we maintain.

While the realm of DNS and domain management is often perceived as a complex and serious field, there is a history brimming with stories and trivia just beneath the surface. In this blog post, we delve into 15 DNS facts that highlight the journey of the internet from its early beginnings to the present day.

 1. 404 Error’s Fashion Inspiration

The infamous “404 Not Found” error is often encountered when a webpage can’t be located due to a DNS issue. Rumor has it that the error is named after Room 404 at CERN, where the original web server was housed. Just like the elusive web pages it represents, Room 404 was notoriously difficult to find.

Of course, the story of the rumor is like a tiny little representation of the internet itself: a hall of mirrors in which multiple contradictory “facts” compete for your attention. Some people state that it’s all bunk: there is no room 404 at CERN, which sounds easy enough to verify. Apparently, there is even a guy who did a TED Talk on the subject!

But here are some real facts: HTTP responses in the 400 range are a class of errors that means that you, the user, have made a mistake. 404 (Not Found) is nestled between its friends 403 (Forbidden, meaning you may not access this item and 405 (Method Not Allowed).

2. The Internet’s Baby Steps

On March 15, 1985, the first-ever domain name was registered:Symbolics.com. Owned by computer manufacturer Symbolics Inc., the company eventually went defunct, but its place in internet history is forever cemented. Fun fact: Symbolics has a mythic status among computer aficionados, and No-IP has one degree of separation from an actual Symbolics computer. Our founder worked at a company where one of the early-stage engineers once worked for Symbolics, and had one stashed in his garage.

3. A World Record with a Twist

As of 2021, the most expensive domain name ever sold was http://Voice.com , which fetched a staggering $30 million in 2019. It’s an impressive price to pay, considering that the DNS is quite literally the “voice” of the internet.

4. A Creative Solution

In 1999, the “ILOVEYOU” virus exploited weaknesses in the DNS and caused widespread chaos. In response, Filipino programmers quickly registered ILoveYou.com to host a virus removal tool, turning the name of the virus against itself.

5. A Digital Time Capsule

Back in 1993, InterNIC was established to manage domain name allocations. To commemorate the event, they buried a time capsule containing mementos of the early days of the internet, set to be opened in 2043. We can expect the return of AngelFire and GeoCities on that date. There will be bright colors and many, many fonts.

6. A Long Way from .com

Before the now-ubiquitous .com domain extension, the internet featured extensions like .arpa, .gov, .edu, .mil, .org, and .net. The .com extension wasn’t introduced until 1985, part of the burst of creativity that enshrined Tears For Fears, Mr. Mister, and Simple Minds in our cultural pantheon.

7. Musical Domains

The internet is home to many strange domain names, but did you know there’s a band called “The .coms”? They own the domain TheDotComs.com, a creative nod to both their name and the internet itself.

8. It’s a Small (Internet) World

While the internet seems infinite, the number of possible IPv4 addresses is limited to 4,294,967,296. With IPv6, however, the number of possible IP addresses jumps to a staggering 340 undecillion (that’s 340 followed by 36 zeros)! This means that all the hairs on all the Bigfoots could have their own address. Why they would need this is beyond the scope of this discussion.

9. Colleagues Turned Internet Superstars

The way we use the internet is all thanks to a couple of American Computer Scientists that were just trying to figure out a way to improve the US Advanced Research Projects Agency Network’S (ARPANET) address naming system that didn’t involve contacting someone at Standford during business hours. Paul Mockapetris invented the internet’s Domain Name system (DNS) in 1983, and his colleague, Jon Postel, created many of the standards governing the internet today, including the management of IP addresses and the formation of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).It’s no wonder Mockapetris and Postel are inducted into the Internet Hall of Fame!

10. The Million Dollar Homepage

In 2005, a British student named Alex Tew came up with the idea to sell advertising space on a website by the pixel. He launched a website called The Million Dollar Homepage, offering one million pixels for sale at $1 per pixel. The website quickly became a sensation, and Tew managed to sell all one million pixels, making a cool million dollars. Part of the deal, though, was that each pixel had to be eventually delivered to its owner via FedEx, which due to increased shipping costs ate into profits considerably.

11. A Domain Name Squatting Windfall

In 2007, a man named Chris Clark sold the domain name Pizza.com for a staggering $2.6 million. He had initially registered the domain back in 1994 for $20, making it one of the most profitable domain squatting in history.

12. The Lengthy Domain Name

While domain names typically range from 3 to 63 characters in length, the longest domain name ever registered is a whopping 63 characters long: “http://abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcdefghijk.com“. It consists of the alphabet repeated twice followed by the first 11 letters once more. Likely fact: the website has been visited four times in 20 years. No one can type it correctly and it turned out the content wasn’t fun enough to bookmark.

13. Short, Simple, and Purposeful

Top-Level Domains (TLDs) are domain extensions you find after the final dot of a web address. For example, .com, .de, .us, and so on. TLDs are important for providing a legitimate way for users to distinguish the purpose or geographical region of a website, but also how a website functions. Check out this comprehensive list of TLDs available.

It used to be that TLDs were limited to countries, and specific “kinds” of sites, like commercial entities (the ubiquitous .com), non-profit organizations (touchy-feel .org) or government agencies (.gov, which always leads to a broken site and/or the DMV). The U.S. military (the Internet’s “angel investor” if you want to call it that), has its own: .mil. Now there are many TLDs and some of them are…kinda spicy. You know which ones they are, don’t act all innocent.

14. Internet Time Machine

Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to go back in time? Well, you can with the Internet Archive: Wayback Machine. Simply type in the URL, select the date range you’re looking for, and check out that archived version of the website.

The Internet Archive’s headquarters is a former church located in the Richmond District of San Francisco. The building is large and impressive, with tall Greek columns at the entrance and, inside, nestled among the racks of servers, the pipe organ, and many pews. Some of the No-IP team have physically been there on a tour!

15. The Manager of the Internet

For our final fact, we take a step back to find out who is in charge of making sure the internet is functioning properly. As you probably suspected, it’s Lumberg from Office Space. Ha, fortunately it is not. Because the internet cannot be made to come in on Saturdays.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a non-profit international organization that is responsible for the coordination of technical operations and policies for DNS resources. Without ICANN, the internet would be incredibly unstable, insecure, and disorganized.

So there you have it – As we reflect on these 15 DNS facts, it’s clear that the world of DNS and domain management is far more intriguing and colorful than one might initially assume. These anecdotes not only offer a perspective on the history of the internet, but also highlight the creativity and innovation of the individuals who have contributed to the development and evolution of the DNS infrastructure over the years.

So, as you navigate the internet and appreciate the seamless connectivity that DNS provides, take a moment to remember the surprising history behind the technology that makes our online experiences possible.

Here’s to the pioneers, the innovators, and the dreamers who have shaped the internet – and to those who continue to push the boundaries of what’s possible in the digital realm.

Our Customer Support team helps our users not only manage their IP networks but utilize and navigate our products and services successfully. These interactions not only assist our users but also strengthen their trust and faith in No-IP.

But not everything has been sunshine and rainbows – The No-IP team has dealt with some pretty hairy challenges throughout the years. However, by practicing our company values and working together, we have not only overcome these challenges but put in place tools and processes that create a custom-tailored experience for our users that sets us apart from other Dynamic DNS service providers.

Constructive Criticism is Key

Let’s face it – No one is perfect. You will never have the perfect company or the perfect product. However, you can get pretty close to it! Companies that actually take customer feedback, review it, and do the work to see if it is something they can accommodate are few and far between. Luckily at No-IP, we strive to create the perfect service and provide the best products for our customers.

One of the many things we’ve implemented for customers is two-factor authentication (2FA). This implementation was based on customer feedback requesting to have this security system that requires two separate methods of identification in order to gain access. Our Customer Support team relayed the feedback to Product Development, which was able to find a way to provide 2FA to our customers. Not only that, but our Customer Support team also assists customers daily with setting up 2FA on their No-IP accounts.

If What You Want Doesn’t Exist, Build Your Own!

Billing is the most important part of any business – It is not only a way for users to pay for their service, but it contributes to the user’s experience. If a user is waiting a long time for a refund or answers to their invoice questions, their experience and relationship with the company slowly deteriorate and take a longer time to win back. Over the years, No-IP has worked tirelessly to figure out the best way to manage billing for our users. There were manual processes and monetization platforms that were overpromised and under-delivered. After evaluating many proprietary billing management systems, the No-IP team decided it was best just to build our own system to fit the specific needs of our business and that of the customers we work closely with.

Using what we learned from past payment processors and our “wish list” of steps and widgets that would make our lives easier, our Product Development team was able to build our current Billing Management System from the ground up with lots of feedback and help from the Customer Support team. If you ever needed to add on a subscription to a service, get a refund, or have a question regarding your No-IP invoice, you will find the processes not only fast but extremely efficient.

However, it doesn’t stop there – Our Customer Support team still relays feedback and suggestions to our Product Development team, and they are continuously reviewing and looking for ways to make the Billing Management System better.

Privacy Must Always Be Protected

Privacy is one of the biggest topics our Customer Support team deals with, and rightfully so. It is so common these days to see hundreds of articles a day about companies both large and small getting hacked in the littlest ways. Our Customer Support team has heard it all from users flooding tickets and calls regarding questions and inquiries about how No-IP can best help. Providing customizable Secure Socket Layer Certificates (SSLs) packages to our users is one of the ways we can provide not just privacy, but legitimacy as well. SSL Certificates are data files that create an encrypted and private connection between the web server and the web browser, but most importantly they verify domain ownership and make it so hackers cannot reproduce false pages to trick users or intercept your private information.

The No-IP team created a seamless process to add SSLs to hostnames providing users multiple ways to subscribe or upgrade their SSLs depending on scalability. On top of that, the Customer Support team built out an extensive set of Knowledge Base articles discussing how to get an SSL installed on user devices.

Secure, Protect, and Legitimize

About five months ago, Gmail updated and increased its security settings. Of the changes, one of them was to increase email standards to protect recipients and legitimize senders. The way this is done is there are hidden values in the sender’s domain, such as SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records that the recipient doesn’t see. however, these are verification records added to the user’s domain that tell Gmail and other Email providers who is authorized (or not) to send email from the domain. Without them, anybody can potentially send emails from the domain, making Gmail (understandably) wary of your emails.

Although added security increased protection for everyone involved, it did cause some headaches and hiccups for users that found the measures frustrating when their emails kept getting bounced back. Our Customer Support team not only understood and helped users that reached out to us for help, but they also created a handy guide in our Knowledge Base to help these users get their domains situated.

At No-IP, we believe that challenges are only opportunities in disguise, and we take pride in overcoming them to provide the best possible experience for our users. Our team works tirelessly to ensure that our Dynamic DNS service remains reliable, secure, and easy to use. We are grateful for our community of users who continue to support us through the challenges and successes. Thank you for choosing No-IP as your trusted DNS provider.