KadNode - P2P DNS

KadNode finds the IP address of other instances on the Internet or local network. It is used like DNS, but is based on the decentralized BitTorrent network.

KadNode intercepts .p2p domain queries on the systems level and resolves them using a decentralized Kademlia DHT network. Additionally, TLS authentication can be used to make sure the correct IP address was found. If successful, the IP address is passed to the application making the request.

Features

• Support for two kinds of domains:
  1. public key domains as <public-key>.p2p
     • No need to exchange any further keys/certificates
     • Uses secp256r1 ECC key pairs
  2. named domains like yourdomain.com.p2p
     • Needs pre-shared certificates (self-signed root certificates or e.g. Let's Encrypt)
     • Uses TLS session handshake for authentication
• IPv4/IPv6 support
• UPnP/NAT-PMP support
• Local peer discovery
• Small size / ~100KB depending on features / ~50KB compressed
• Command line control program
• NSS support through /etc/nsswitch.conf
• DNS server interface and DNS proxy
  • Handles A (IPv4 address),AAAA (IPv6), and SRV requests
• Packages for ArchLinux, Debian, FreeBSD, MacOSX, OpenWrt, Windows
• Peer file import/export on startup/shutdown and every 24h
• Uses sha256 hash method

Documentation

• Manual Page
• Implementation Details
• Usage examples
• FAQ
• Wiki
• Video: KadNode decentralized DNS system - 34. Chaos Communication Congress

Installation

You can download the latest package from releases page

OpenWrt routers

From official package repository: opkg install kadnode

Debian/Ubuntu

From PPA repository:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:stokito/kadnode
sudo apt update
sudo apt install kadnode

Or install a downloaded package with dpkg -i kadnode_*.deb

FreeBSD

From repository: pkg install kadnode

Or install a downloaded package with pkg install kadnode-*.txz

ArchLinux

From repository: yay -S kadnode

Or install a downloaded package with pacman -U kadnode-*.pkg.tar.xz

Build from sources

Install libraries and their headers. On Debian/Ubuntu use:

sudo apt install libmbedtls-dev, libnatpmp-dev, libminiupnpc-dev

Checkout code and compile KadNode:

git clone https://github.com/mwarning/KadNode.git
cd KadNode
# basic features and debug mode
FEATURES="bob tls cmd dns debug" make
# all features
FEATURES="bob tls cmd lpd dns nss natpmp upnp debug" make

Finally, start KadNode:

./build/kadnode

To install use:

sudo make install install_nss

To uninstall:

sudo make uninstall uninstall_nss

Related Projects

• pkdns and Pkarr ed25519 pubkey domains on Mainline DHT.
• btlink an HTTP addressing scheme for BitTorrent.
• opendht a DHT daemon used by Ring softphone.
• DNSLink Standard a format used by IPFS for DNS TXT records to associate content and identifiers with a domain.
• Tor Onion Services
• GNUnet Name System secure and decentralized naming system
• NameCoin blockchain for DNS

License

MIT/X11

Authors

• KadNode: Moritz Warning (http://github.com/mwarning/KadNode)
• Kademlia DHT: Juliusz Chroboczek (https://github.com/jech/dht)