There are many third party websites that can verify a domain’s DNS records.
It can also be done from Linux terminal. Why not try yourself, instead of using 3rd party sites?
NIX users spend more time on terminal and looking for a viable option from the terminal for any purpose.
This will be useful not only for me, but also for others looking for a way to do their daily activities at the terminal.
Domain DNS information can be verified from the Linux terminal using the following three commands.
- host Command
- dig Command
- nslookup Command
Use one of the below command to verify domain owner information from the Linux terminal.
- whois – A CLI Tool to Check Information About Owner of a Domain Name and IP Address
- jwhois – A Tool to Check Information About Ownership of a Domain Name and IP Address in Linux
What’s Domain Name System (DNS)?
DNS stands for Domain Name System or Domain Name Servers which translates Internet domain and host names to IP addresses and vice versa.
DNS is a hierarchical decentralized naming system for computers, services, or other resources connected to the Internet or a private network.
It’s basically a set of mapping files that tell the DNS server which IP address each domain or host is associated with, and how to handle requests sent to each domain.
It stores various information about a domain & host such as A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, PTR, NS, SOA, SRV, TXT, and NAPTR.
A Record : A record stands for Address record. The ‘A’ record specifies the IP address (IPv4) of a host. Whenever DNS server get a query to resolve domain-name, it will refer the A record to answer the IP address.
AAA Record : The ‘AAA’ record specifies the IP address (IPv6) of a host.
NS Record : NS Record stands for Name Server record. NS Records maps a domain name to a list of authoritative DNS servers.
MX Record : MX Record stands for mail exchange record. MX Records maps a domain name to a list of mail exchange servers.
PTR Record : PTR record stands for Reverse lookup record or Pointer record. A PTR record maps the IP address to a specific host.
CNAME Record : CNAME Record stands for Canonical Name. CNAME record is used to create aliases that point to other names such as WWW, FTP, MAIL & subdomains to a domain name. Example : a CNAME record can associate the subdomain www.2daygeek.com with 2daygeek.com
SOA Record : SOA record stands for Start of Authority records. SOA records contain information about a DNS zone such as Primary nameserver, Hostmaster E-mail address, zone file seriel number, zone transfer interval and zone expiry details.
TXT Record : TXT Record stands for text record. A TXT record is a type of DNS record that provides text information to sources outside your domain. The text can be either human-or machine-readable and can be used for a variety of purposes.
SPF Record : SPF Record stands for Sender Policy Framework. SPF is an extension to the SMTP mail protocol which is used for e-mail authentication.
SPF record is used to verify whether the message came from an authorized mail server or not. SPF is designed to detect SPAM & PHISHING mail sender’s IP address which was included in the e-mail headers.
DKIM Record : DKIM record stands for Domain Keys Identified Mail. DKIM is an email validation system designed to detect email spoofing by providing encryption authentication to receiving mail exchangers.
It will check whether the incoming mail domain is authorized by the domain’s administrators and that the email (including attachments) has not been modified during transport.
A digital signature included with the message can be validated by the recipient using the signer’s public key published in the DNS.
1) How to verify a domain’s DNS records using the dig command
dig command stands for “domain information groper”. It is a flexible tool for interrogating DNS name servers. It performs DNS lookup and displays the answers that are returned from the name server(s) that were queried.
Most DNS administrators use dig to troubleshoot DNS problems because of its flexibility, ease of use and clarity of output. Other lookup tools tend to have less functionality than dig.
# dig google.com ANY +noall +answer google.com. 282 IN A 216.58.199.142 google.com. 282 IN AAAA 2404:6800:4009:806::200e google.com. 21582 IN CAA 0 issue "pki.goog" google.com. 21582 IN NS ns1.google.com. google.com. 582 IN MX 30 alt2.aspmx.l.google.com. google.com. 42 IN SOA ns1.google.com. dns-admin.google.com. 275230101 900 900 1800 60 google.com. 282 IN TXT "docusign=1b0a6754-49b1-4db5-8540-d2c12664b289" google.com. 21582 IN NS ns2.google.com. google.com. 582 IN MX 10 aspmx.l.google.com. google.com. 582 IN MX 50 alt4.aspmx.l.google.com. google.com. 3582 IN TXT "globalsign-smime-dv=CDYX+XFHUw2wml6/Gb8+59BsH31KzUr6c1l2BPvqKX8=" google.com. 3582 IN TXT "v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com ~all" google.com. 282 IN TXT "docusign=05958488-4752-4ef2-95eb-aa7ba8a3bd0e" google.com. 21582 IN NS ns4.google.com. google.com. 21582 IN NS ns3.google.com. google.com. 582 IN MX 20 alt1.aspmx.l.google.com. google.com. 3582 IN TXT "facebook-domain-verification=22rm551cu4k0ab0bxsw536tlds4h95" google.com. 582 IN MX 40 alt3.aspmx.l.google.com
2) Checking DNS records of a domain using nslookup command
nslookup command is a program to query Internet domain name servers. Nslookup has two modes interactive and non-interactive.
Interactive mode allows the user to query name servers for information about various hosts and domains or to print a list of hosts in a domain.
Non-interactive mode is used to print just the name and requested information for a host or domain. It’s a network administration tool which will help them to check and troubleshoot DNS related issues.
# nslookup -type=any google.com Server: 192.168.1.1 Address: 192.168.1.1#53 Non-authoritative answer: Name: google.com Address: 216.58.199.142 Name: google.com Address: 2404:6800:4009:806::200e google.com rdata_257 = 0 issue "pki.goog" google.com nameserver = ns1.google.com. google.com mail exchanger = 30 alt2.aspmx.l.google.com. google.com origin = ns1.google.com mail addr = dns-admin.google.com serial = 275230101 refresh = 900 retry = 900 expire = 1800 minimum = 60 google.com text = "docusign=1b0a6754-49b1-4db5-8540-d2c12664b289" google.com nameserver = ns2.google.com. google.com mail exchanger = 10 aspmx.l.google.com. google.com mail exchanger = 50 alt4.aspmx.l.google.com. google.com text = "globalsign-smime-dv=CDYX+XFHUw2wml6/Gb8+59BsH31KzUr6c1l2BPvqKX8=" google.com text = "v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com ~all" google.com text = "docusign=05958488-4752-4ef2-95eb-aa7ba8a3bd0e" google.com nameserver = ns4.google.com. google.com nameserver = ns3.google.com. google.com mail exchanger = 20 alt1.aspmx.l.google.com. google.com text = "facebook-domain-verification=22rm551cu4k0ab0bxsw536tlds4h95" google.com mail exchanger = 40 alt3.aspmx.l.google.com. Authoritative answers can be found from:
3) How to check DNS records of a domain using host command
host command is a simple utility for performing DNS lookup. It is normally used to convert names to IP addresses and vice versa. When no arguments or options are given, host prints a short summary of its command line arguments and options as shown below:
# host -a 2daygeek.com Trying "2daygeek.com" ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 59145 ;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 6, AUTHORITY: 2, ADDITIONAL: 3 ;; QUESTION SECTION: ;2daygeek.com. IN ANY ;; ANSWER SECTION: 2daygeek.com. 86321 IN SOA ns1.2daygeek.in. jeyakabil.gmail.com. 2013110202 86400 7200 3600000 86400 2daygeek.com. 14233 IN TXT "v=spf1 ip4:182.71.233.70 +a +mx +ip4:49.50.66.31 ?all" 2daygeek.com. 12127 IN MX 0 2daygeek.com. 2daygeek.com. 12127 IN A 182.71.233.70 2daygeek.com. 84127 IN NS ns1.2daygeek.in. 2daygeek.com. 84127 IN NS ns2.2daygeek.in. ;; AUTHORITY SECTION: 2daygeek.com. 84127 IN NS ns2.2daygeek.in. 2daygeek.com. 84127 IN NS ns1.2daygeek.in. ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION: 2daygeek.com. 12127 IN A 182.71.233.70 ns1.2daygeek.in. 12127 IN A 182.71.233.70 ns2.2daygeek.in. 12127 IN A 182.71.233.70 Received 304 bytes from 83.170.69.2#53 in 13 ms
Closing Notes
We have shown you three commands to find DNS records of a domain in Linux.
If you have any questions or feedback, feel free to comment below.
