This blog post is co-authored by Duane Wessels (Verisign) and Roy Arends (ICANN).
Roughly a year and a half ago, Verisign and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) began the important, multi-year process of updating the cryptographic key that secures the authoritative Domain Name System (DNS) root zone. This work has been largely invisible to the public, but vital to the security of many everyday online activities.
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The Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) help protect the integrity of DNS data, supporting both online navigation and other uses of domain names as identifiers in applications. In the time since DNSSEC was first introduced in 2005, both the RSA algorithm and elliptic curve cryptography have served as the primary signature algorithms for DNSSEC. But with the potential of large-scale quantum computing on the horizon, there may soon come a time when those algorithms no longer suffice.
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Last month, the RSA Conference – one of the world’s largest and most influential forums on cybersecurity and cryptography – honored our colleague, Verisign Chief Technology Officer Burt Kaliski, with a Lifetime Achievement Award for his enduring and significant contribution to the advancement of the cybersecurity industry and cryptography.
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On Jan. 11, 2025, Verisign supported the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in taking a major step to ensure the continued security, stability, and resiliency of the Domain Name System (DNS). While imperceptible to most users, this action – specifically, the introduction of a new Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) Key Signing Key (KSK) in the root zone – is the next step of a multi-year-long process to change, or “roll,” the cryptographic key that secures the root of the DNS. In this blog post, we’ll go into more detail about what this means and what observations we can make about the new key, which we refer to as “KSK-2024.”1
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On October 20th, ICANN and Verisign renewed the agreement under which Verisign will continue to act as Root Zone Maintainer for the Domain Name System (DNS) for another 8-year term. The Root Zone sits atop the hierarchical architecture of the DNS and is essential to virtually all internet navigation, acting as the dynamic, cryptographically secure, global directory of all top-level domains that exist in the DNS. The Root Zone Maintainer is a unique role that ensures the cryptographic signing and publication of the Root Zone no less than once a day, without which, navigation on the internet would be impossible.
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Every day, there are tens of thousands of domain names registered across the globe – often as a key first step in creating a unique online presence. Making that experience possible for Verisign-operated top-level domains (TLDs) like .com and .net is a powerful and flexible technology platform first introduced 25 years ago.
Thanks to the Shared Registration System (SRS) – a hardware and software system conceptualized, designed, and launched by our teams 25 years ago – we’re able to successfully manage relationships with approximately 2,000 ICANN-accredited registrars who generally submit more than 100 million domain name transactions daily. Over the past quarter century, the SRS has thrived and grown with the global internet, in large part because we’ve continuously scaled and evolved the technology to meet exponentially increasing global demand, and a rapidly changing cyberthreat landscape.
The quantum computing era is coming, and it will change everything about how the world connects online. While quantum computing will yield tremendous benefits, it will also create new risks, so it’s essential that we prepare our critical internet infrastructure for what’s to come. That’s why we’re so pleased to share our latest efforts in this area, including technology that we’re making available as an open source implementation to help internet operators worldwide prepare.
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Celebrating National Hispanic Heritage Month reminds us how the wide range of perspectives and experiences among our employees makes us stronger both as a company and as a steward of the internet. In honor of this month, we are proud to recognize the stories of three of our Hispanic employees, and the positive impact they make at Verisign.
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As part of Verisign’s ongoing effort to make global internet infrastructure more secure, stable, and resilient, we will soon make an important technology update to how we protect the top-level domains (TLDs) we operate. The vast majority of internet users won’t notice any difference, but the update will support enhanced security for several Verisign-operated TLDs and pave the way for broader adoption and the next era of Domain Name System (DNS) security measures.
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In 2021, we discussed a potential future shift from established public-key algorithms to so-called “post-quantum” algorithms, which may help protect sensitive information after the advent of quantum computers. We also shared some of our initial research on how to apply these algorithms to the Domain Name System Security Extensions, or DNSSEC. In the time since that blog post, we’ve continued to explore ways to address the potential operational impact of post-quantum algorithms on DNSSEC, while also closely tracking industry research and advances in this area.
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