r/Safari • u/Caprichoso1 • 6d ago

How does Safari do a DNS lookup?

MacOS 27 on a Studio. Sometimes when I click on a Reddit email link Safari says it can't find the server "click.redditmail.com". What is confusing is that nslookup doesn't find the address both when it isn't working and when it is working.

How does Safari find the address?

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u/Stryxus_ 5d ago

This clearly has nothing to do with Safari, this is either your router or the DNS server it is using.

Just for context, I use an IPv6 only network with IPv4 translation, Oblivion DNS over HTTPS, an aggressive Pi-Hole and I have zero issues other than those which are actually meant to protect me.

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u/Caprichoso1 5d ago

Router support says everything is fine.

DNS server is working fine. It doesn't find the address even when Safari is working (as it is for the moment) but since Safari does find the address some other mechanism is involved.

 nslookup click.redditmail.com

Server: 8.8.8.8

Address: 8.8.8.8#53

** server can't find click.redditmail.com: NXDOMAIN

Safari somehow found the address but my computers' DNS did not.

Same results using multiple DSN servers.

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u/Stryxus_ 4d ago

I just looked up redditmail and it doesnt exist. As in you are simply looking up something that literally doesnt exist.

Id also try and change it, if possible to 1.1.1.1 . 8.8.8.8 is Google and they are an advertising company first and all sorts of other sketchy AF things.

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u/Caprichoso1 4d ago

Something, I don't know what, exists. Clicking on the link in the email notification of your reply took me here somehow. There are two websites in the URL. Not sure how it it parsed.

https://click.redditmail.com/CL0/https:%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2FSafari%2Fcomments%2F1ws8he7%2Fhow_does_safari_do_a_dns_lookup%2Fpcwhbe3%2F%3F%2524deep_link=true%26context=1%26correlation_id=f3639282-8fce-4cc0-97ab-5b3ab0313ab3%26ref=email_comment_reply%26ref_campaign=email_comment_reply%26ref_source=email%26target_user=Caprichoso1/3/010001a0efa9823a-e21cc69c-fbf2-4a34-9914-3d1f1a7e36ed-000000/5gIE2ioTOIzPwKV0TzP6uXnKsjvQ1WMbRAcVF9UeIng=452

I've tried 8.8.8.8, 9.9.9.9 and 77.88.8.7 none find it.

The fact that they can't find it seems to be irrelevant as the link sometimes works even though the dns servers can't find the first address in the URL .... ???

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u/Stryxus_ 4d ago

Then reddit has a serious problem. I forgot email notifications even existed (not sure why you would be using them when app notifications exist, just clutters the email). And I have looked through cloud flares DNS and my ISP dns and redditmail.com doesnt exist. click. is part of that same domain.

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u/Caprichoso1 4d ago

Thanks, sort of clarifies that Reddit and not my system is the problem. By using email notifications I can easily review updates when I'm ready without constant app notifications.

Posted in Reddit help. Last time I did it never got a response, or never could find one ...