Re: [Full-Disclosure] IE6 Download

[Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu]

On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 23:22:54 BST, Peter Ellison <p.pe@btopenworld.com>  said:
> Hello List.
> 
> I downloaded the patch via Windoze update for Exploder 6 this Morning. No
> problems with that 2 Min max. Took the shut down option, system reboots all
> OK. Point Browser @ my ISPs home page to check the config, the firewall
> tells me modules have changed (as expected) and I release the application,
> so far so good. It's at this stage the firewall starts to object as shown
> below.
> 
> 80.15.236.33 = AKAMAI FT UK                    Port 1421 = Gandalf?
> 
> Am I being paranoid or IS there something going on here.

Akamai is a large well-known company that provides (basically) net-caching for
paying customers - rather than have the content on one website, an Akamai'zed
site will direct you to the nearest Akamai cache.

We have an Akamai rack in our machine room, it's quite nice when you're surfing
along, and the website is 2 hops away, and the slow hop is 100BaseT. ;)

Incidentally, they implement it using some DNS games - the URL will have a
hostname like g42.a19.akamai.net, and if *I* query their DNS, they'll see I'm
somewhere in 128.173/16 and give me back a DNS reply that points at our Akamai
rack.. If somebody elsewhere looks it up, they'll get back a *different* reply
with a different address...

I'll bet if you traceroute from 81.152.xx.xx to 80.15.236.33, you'll find that
it's REALLY close by, network-wise.

Microsoft was basically forced into this because they're having performance
issues with windowsupdate.microsoft.com - having all 750 million Windows users
download the patch for MS03-026 through one pipe really sucks.  It must have
stuck in their craw to sign the contract, as Akamai is a Linux-oid box.... :)

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