.invalid

Last updated
invalid
Introduced1999
TLD type Reserved top-level domain
StatusReserved to prevent conflict and confusion
Intended useWhen necessary to show an address guaranteed to be invalid
Actual use Session Initiation Protocol, for identity protection; address munging e.g. on Usenet
Documents RFC   2606, 3325

The name invalid is reserved by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) as a domain name that may not be installed as a top-level domain in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. [1]

Contents

Reserved DNS names

In 1999, the Internet Engineering Task Force reserved the DNS labels example , invalid, localhost , and test so that they may not be installed into the root zone of the Domain Name System.

The reasons for reservation of these top-level domain names is to reduce the likelihood of conflict and confusion. [1] This allows the use of these names for either documentation purposes or in local testing scenarios.

Purpose

This top-level domain is sometimes used as a pseudo domain name in Uniform Resource Identifiers (URIs) to convey either an error condition or in use of privacy protection. A notable instance of this usage is in the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) where the domain name anonymous.invalid in a SIP URI indicates hiding of a caller's identity. [2]

Related Research Articles

The Domain Name System (DNS) is a hierarchical and distributed naming system for computers, services, and other resources in the Internet or other Internet Protocol (IP) networks. It associates various information with domain names assigned to each of the associated entities. Most prominently, it translates readily memorized domain names to the numerical IP addresses needed for locating and identifying computer services and devices with the underlying network protocols. The Domain Name System has been an essential component of the functionality of the Internet since 1985.

The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is a signaling protocol used for initiating, maintaining, and terminating communication sessions that include voice, video and messaging applications. SIP is used in Internet telephony, in private IP telephone systems, as well as mobile phone calling over LTE (VoLTE).

A top-level domain (TLD) is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet after the root domain. The top-level domain names are installed in the root zone of the name space. For all domains in lower levels, it is the last part of the domain name, that is, the last non empty label of a fully qualified domain name. For example, in the domain name www.example.com, the top-level domain is .com. Responsibility for management of most top-level domains is delegated to specific organizations by the ICANN, an Internet multi-stakeholder community, which operates the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), and is in charge of maintaining the DNS root zone.

In computing, Internet Key Exchange is the protocol used to set up a security association (SA) in the IPsec protocol suite. IKE builds upon the Oakley protocol and ISAKMP. IKE uses X.509 certificates for authentication ‒ either pre-shared or distributed using DNS ‒ and a Diffie–Hellman key exchange to set up a shared session secret from which cryptographic keys are derived. In addition, a security policy for every peer which will connect must be manually maintained.

A Service record is a specification of data in the Domain Name System defining the location, i.e., the hostname and port number, of servers for specified services. It is defined in RFC 2782, and its type code is 33. Some Internet protocols such as the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) and the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) often require SRV support by network elements.

In computer networking, localhost is a hostname that refers to the current computer used to access it. The name localhost is reserved for loopback purposes. It is used to access the network services that are running on the host via the loopback network interface. Using the loopback interface bypasses any local network interface hardware.

The domain name arpa is a top-level domain (TLD) in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. It is used predominantly for the management of technical network infrastructure. Prominent among such functions are the subdomains in-addr.arpa and ip6.arpa, which provide namespaces for reverse DNS lookup of IPv4 and IPv6 addresses, respectively.

example.com Domain name reserved for documentation purposes and as an example of the use of domain names

The domain names example.com, example.net, example.org, and example.edu are second-level domain names in the Domain Name System of the Internet. They are reserved by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) at the direction of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) as special-use domain names for documentation purposes. The domain names are used widely in books, tutorials, sample network configurations, and generally as examples for the use of domain names. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) operates web sites for these domains with content that reflects their purpose.

The name example is reserved by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) as a domain name that may not be installed as a top-level domain in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet.

A Name Authority Pointer (NAPTR) is a type of resource record in the Domain Name System of the Internet.

The name localhost is reserved by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) as a domain name label that may not be installed as a top-level domain in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet.

.test is a reserved top-level domain intended for usage in software testing. It is guaranteed to never be registered into the Internet.

The domain name .local is a special-use domain name reserved by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) so that it may not be installed as a top-level domain in the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet. As such it is similar to the other special domain names, such as .localhost. However, .local has since been designated for use in link-local networking, in applications of multicast DNS (mDNS) and zero-configuration networking (zeroconf) so that DNS service may be established without local installations of conventional DNS infrastructure on local area networks.

In the Internet addressing architecture, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) have reserved various Internet Protocol (IP) addresses for special purposes.

In networking, a black hole, also known as a block hole, refers to a place in the network where incoming or outgoing traffic is silently discarded, without informing the source that the data did not reach its intended recipient.

The SIP URI scheme is a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) scheme for the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) multimedia communications protocol. A SIP address is a URI that addresses a specific telephone extension on a voice over IP system. Such a number could be a private branch exchange or an E.164 telephone number dialled through a specific gateway. The scheme was defined in RFC 3261.

An IPv6 transition mechanism is a technology that facilitates the transitioning of the Internet from the Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) infrastructure in use since 1983 to the successor addressing and routing system of Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6). As IPv4 and IPv6 networks are not directly interoperable, transition technologies are designed to permit hosts on either network type to communicate with any other host.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">IPv6 address</span> Label to identify a network interface of a computer or other network node

An Internet Protocol Version 6 address is a numeric label that is used to identify and locate a network interface of a computer or a network node participating in a computer network using IPv6. IP addresses are included in the packet header to indicate the source and the destination of each packet. The IP address of the destination is used to make decisions about routing IP packets to other networks.

The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is the signaling protocol selected by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) to create and control multimedia sessions with multiple participants in the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS). It is therefore a key element in the IMS framework.

References

  1. 1 2 D. Eastlake; A. Panitz (June 1999). Reserved Top Level DNS Names. Network Working Group. doi: 10.17487/RFC2606 . BCP 32. RFC 2606.Best Common Practice. Updated by RFC  6761.
  2. C. Jennings; J. Peterson; M. Watson (November 2002). Private Extensions to the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) for Asserted Identity within Trusted Networks. Network Working Group. doi: 10.17487/RFC3325 . RFC 3325.Informational. Updated by RFC  5876 and 8217.