Free Republic DNS entry seems to be gone

N/A | 04/04/2016 | N/A

[Pox]

I was surfing FR this afternoon and suddenly was unable to access any page on FR and the error stated the server could not be found.

I located the IP address, 209.157.64.200, of the server and then added an entry into my PC's host file and I can now see FR again.

I still do not see a DNS entry for FR, and that is interesting.

[zzeeman]

Thanks, FRiend, I will see what I can find!

[Sarah Barracuda]

The only thing I still notice is that on my Samsung Galaxy S6 phone I still can’t go on this site, it directs me back to t-mobile’s home page

[Red Steel]

You’re welcome. And no, unless FR for some reason changes its IP address at a later date.

[Red Steel]

You’re welcome. :)

[CreviceTool]

When I switch to Wi-Fi from a fully authenticated FR connection using my AT&T Wireless smartphone, I get the DNS error and it restores my authenticated log-in at FR.

[MainiacSquirrel]

The way DNS Servers work is they resolve domain names to IP Addresses, the domain name Registrar one uses, maintains the record to the Name Server and other WHOIS information.

In the case of this issue here, gkg.net who is the Registrar for FreeRepublic.com is pointing to a nonfunctional Name Server:

Name Server: NS.ROBINSON-DEFEHR.COM.20081216130856.DELETED.GKG.NET
Name Server: NS2.ROBINSON-DEFEHR.COM.20081216130852.DELETED.GKG.NET

ICANN gives this information to all Root DNS Servers, that means that as the DNS Servers update they will lose the IP Address for FreeRepublic.com which causes this issue.

So the only way to fix the problem is to get GKG.NET to update the Name Server to be correct again.

[catnipman]

as of 11:00am mountain time, comcast dns server:

nrcns.cmc.co.denver.comcast.net

is unable to resolve www.freerepublic.com or freerepublic.com

i added entries into my hosts file to enable access.

[upchuck]

We have reached the end of the internet. Now what?

How 'bout we all turn off our computers, go outside, get some sun and go for a walk?

[upcountry miss]

I’ll vote for that!! Asked for help a few weeks ago on FR and some kind soul tried to help. First instruction was “go to start”. Really? When I hit the power button, that is start for me. Now, just scanning one post, I see, DNS server,host file,system root.drivers host,properties,security, full control, modify,write and apply-none of which means a thing to me. Guess I have to continue to wait for daughter to get home when I have problems. Why is life so complicated after you hit the eighties?

[1_Rain_Drop]

Thank you for your instructions. They worked for me!
I did clear the FR cookies before I started.

[steve86]

If you aren’t already in contact with them:

“For all customer support inquiries, please email us at: support@gkg.net“

[catbertz]

This started for me last night on Frontier(formerly Verizon fios), as well as Verizon wireless. As of now, it’s seemingly fixed on VZ wireless, but still intermittent on Frontier.

[Scutter]

Actually, if you check the GKG.NET entry directly (http://gkg.net/whois), you'll see that the settings are correct there now. Unfortunately, depending on the TTL settings for the entry, it can take a LONG time for the fix to propagate to all the DNS servers. 24 - 72 hours is not an unreasonable amount of time to expect...

Also, I poked around a bit, and I see some other things that are not good from a standpoint of DNS set-up. For example:

• The primary nameserver NS.ROBINSON-DEFEHR.COM was not able to correctly resolve NS2.ROBINSON-DEFEHR.COM.
• Both nameservers resolve to the same IP address (WTF?)
• The NS entry for freerepublic.com is pointing to ns.freerepublic.com. I think that should be pointing to NS.ROBINSON-DEFEHR.COM, not a subdomain of the domain you're trying to resolve.
• At least one of the entries had a TTL of 3 days - probably not what you want.

I'm not a DNS expert by any means - I know just enough to be dangerous - but I would highly recommend that Jim pay someone who IS an expert to look into this and straighten things out. DNS is the sort of thing that looks simple on the surface, but is loaded with land mines for the unsuspecting to step on.

[Cedar]

I spoke too soon! Was OK hardwired on laptop for about an hour, but now Charter is redirecting me when I go to FR website. I’m back now using my cell phone to access FR.

[MEG33]

Try To Imagine How It Would Be Without
Free Republic


PLEASE DONATE

[Malsua]

DNS Still no good for me here.

I had to add

209.157.64.200 www.freerepublic.com

to my hosts file to gain access to this site.

[Monty22002]

Just did same thing, was using the IP directly but couldn’t login.

And yes my Verizon got switched to Frontier. I had TV/net outage all yesterday and they said they might be down until the 8th! Somehow it started working today when I rebooted the garage box. What a pain.

[Cedar]

Think I’ll hook up the desktop, and maybe try changing host file. This phone is not good for serious surfing!

[Red Steel]

:-)

[Fresh Wind]

I lost FR sometime in the last 2 hours (Verizon).

Put the good stuff into the hosts file, and now seems OK.

I’m on win 7, other versions might be different.

To edit the hosts files, you must run notepad as administrator. To do this, navigate to the notepad.exe file (in the Windows directory), right click, and select “Run As Administrator). Then, from notepad, navigate to the C:/windows/system32/drivers/etc folder, select “all files” and open the hosts file.

You might have to enable the display of hidden files, through the tools/folder-options/view menu selection

Be sure to enter “209.157.64.200 www.freerepublic.com”, the first time I tried it, I left out the “www” part, and it didn’t work.