Is there anything I can do to fix my domain?

Krzysztof Dabrowski

3/1/23, 2:57 PM

I am looking for a help with the domain loopla.com. In general it all seems to be OK. It was recently purchased and initially hosted on GoDaddy, moved to Google Cloud and recently to Cloudflare. Originally, it was created and used about 15 years ago - not sure if this could cause any issues?

Tests on https://dnschecker.org/dns-record-validation.php look good - 15 out of 17 tests are OK - just two warnings related to SOA format, but I guess, this is beyond my control as these are Cloudflare internal settings:

SOA Serial Number Format is Invalid.
SOA Expire Value is out of recommended range.

There is however a problem for users under BT network. It's not happening instantly but after some time of usage, that DNS requests stops to return IP response for that domain.

This is what happens for private user with BT Hubs and default internet settings:

In the browser it throws DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NXDOMAIN - site can't be reached.
Ping from console

ping: loopla.com: Name or service not known

Dig from console - no IP, no response to query

dig loopla.com

; <<>> DiG 9.16.1-Ubuntu <<>> loopla.com
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NXDOMAIN, id: 15162
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 1

;; OPT PSEUDOSECTION:
; EDNS: version: 0, flags:; udp: 512
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;loopla.com.                    IN      A

;; Query time: 20 msec
;; SERVER: 172.20.0.1#53(172.20.0.1)
;; WHEN: Mon Nov 01 14:11:17 GMT 2021
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 39

Problems could be instantly solved by changing default DNS settings on the machine e.g. to Google 8.8.8.8, etc. But most of the users would not know or care to do it so I'm reaching out for help as I'm not sure if there is anything I can do on my end to fix any problem which BT might have with this domain?

Is it BT internal problem? If yes could anyone provide any contact details over there as I can't find anything online? Attempt to call their help/support line didn't help, as the only response I've got from them is:

We do not deal with such problems.

0 + 0

domain-name-system

dns-hosting

Esa Jokinen

3/1/23, 3:38 PM

This doesn't seem like a problem with your authoritative DNS, but a bug in BT Hub's DNS cache.

Patrick Mevzek

3/1/23, 3:45 PM

Agreeing with Esa. The typicaly reply for `A` query is 1232 bytes which is close/just over some typical limits and that may negatively affect a broken recursive nameserveer. Clients of BT should contact BT to explain this issue, or change their nameserver...

Krzysztof Dabrowski

3/1/23, 4:05 PM

I've got confirmation of the same problems reported by number of BT customers but in most cases they do not have a technical skills or knowledge to understand that problem is with their provider not with a page. Today I was calling BT help line and the guy on other side couldn't offer me help or solution or any internal technical contact number to escalate the issue. Also he was able to access that domain so couldn't replicate the problem, which makes the whole situation even more problematic to explain and process.

djdomi

3/1/23, 4:15 PM

you may test with a unrestricted vpn to cut out the bt and test with direct access to the internet

Krzysztof Dabrowski

3/1/23, 4:32 PM

Thanks, djdomi. Yes, switching to VPN or disabling home Wi-Fi and switching to mobile network could solve the problem instantly as it will start to use different DNS but I do not want to solve my own problem but to make this domain accessible for all non technical users which are BT customers and are not aware of such problems.

djdomi

3/1/23, 5:57 PM

you might want to use with nslookup the bt and then a public dns, if the bt resolver is broken... i wish you the best already since the standard support will mostly not be able to handle such requests