Google launched its popular public DNS service (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4) eight years ago. As of August 12th, 2018 at 12:30 AM UTC, it is eight years, eight months and eight days old. Though it isn’t as popular as other Google services, it is being used by over 10 per cent of all internet users as their primary DNS server, and it serves well over a trillion queries per day. The service even aimed at making DNS lookups faster. According to their blog post:
From the start, a key goal of Google Public DNS was to make the internet faster. When we began the project in 2007, Google had already made it faster to search the web, but it could take a while to get to your destination. Back then, most DNS lookups used your ISP’s resolvers, and with small caches, they often had to make multiple DNS queries before they could return an address.
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The service is also used extensively by Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) to distribute large, delay-sensitive content like streaming videos to users. It has also helped in resolving queries sent from remote locations. It does it by sending the end part of your IP address in their DNS queries so that CDN name servers can get your best possible GeoIP location. By transmitting only the first three parts of users’ IP addresses CDNs can return the closest content while maintaining privacy.
It is also used by Google Station in Indian railway locations, while ISPs in Africa and Southeast Asia rely on it to resolve customer DNS queries. It is in line with the Next Billion Users initiative that aims to get internet access to regions that don’t have it. Additionally, in recent history, Google Public DNS played a role in getting Turkish users online after the government blocked Twitter. The company aims to continue to improve Google Public DNS both behind the scenes and in ways visible to users, adding features that users want from their DNS service.
Source: Google security blog
