tomiDNS: Much more than a DNS

The tomiDNS is one of the key components that makes tomiNet censorship-resistant and capture-resistant. Not everyone is aware of the purpose of a DNS, or Domain Naming Service, and the Web3 iterations of ENS and Namecoin provide functionality that diverges from the original capabilities of DNS. This post explains the need for DNS, how DNS centralization endangers freedom, and how tomi has implemented a much stronger and censorship-resistant paradigm, based on both Web2 and Web3 technologies.

Domain Addressing Functionality

The original DNS network was designed to translate the IP address numbers into human-readable domains. When you create a website today, the website host uses a 128-bit IP address to identify the website host location. You can think of an IP address as the longitude and latitude of a location on the globe. Nobody uses the longitude and latitude in everyday language, because it is too difficult to remember. Instead, we use human-readable addresses that indicate a country, city, street, and street number. (Fun fact, startup what3words has created a simplified and more granular system for every location on earth, identifying every 3 meter square location with three words.) In the same way that physical addresses use a human-readable system, domain names provide a human-readable system for website addresses. For example, the IP address for facebook.com is 66.220.144.0, but you don’t need to know that.

Of course, the Web3 community has the same problem. Cryptocurrency public keys are close to impossible to remember. While many people do memorize their mnemonic seed phrases (good idea), the public keys are just too difficult for almost anyone to remember. For that reason, systems such as Namecoin and ENS were developed to create a human-readable name for the sending of cryptocurrency to other addresses. ENS addresses are formatted as yourname.ens and when someone sends Ethereum or any Ethereum-based token to yourname.ens, it arrives at that public address. It’s much easier to remember than the 42-character hexadecimal address assigned on the blockchain.

Obviously, there’s a big difference between an address used as a domain name and an address used as a wallet address. If you wanted your website to match your wallet address—well, that’s not possible today. You could have a yourname.com address and a yourname.ens token address, and those would have to be acquired separately.

tomiDNS creates a unified address with both functionalities. If you have a yourname.tomi address it functions as your website domain and as your crypto wallet address. In fact, tomi is developing the ability for that wallet to be a multi-chain system for multiple types of tokens… more about that later.

Who Is in Charge of DNS and ENS?

DNS has been cited as one of the choke points that causes the WWW to be a censored network. The DNS network is officially governed by ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), which came out of the US Department of Commerce in 1998, to replace computer scientist Jon Postel, who had been single-handedly managing internet protocol registries until that time. While the ICANN is governed by a global board of 16 members, it is beholden to the US laws, run as a non-profit based in California. The DNS servers themselves are highly distributed throughout the world, however, they are owned by 13 organizations, 11 of which are US-based, and which include NASA and the Department of Defense. This authority over the addressing system of the internet represents a tremendous concentration of power with tremendous potential for exploiting this power.

As the NSA surveillance disclosures of the past decade and the more recent Twitter Files reveal, the US government routinely coerces US-based companies to engage in surveillance and censorship. In the case of DNS and ICANN, no coercion is required, nor can we expect the leaking of internal files to let the public know what is done behind closed doors in these organizations. For this reason, a decentralized DNS system is absolutely essential for the freedom of the internet. tomi contends that there is absolutely no way to fix the existing system and that another parallel system must emerge to replace the censored WWW.

The case of ENS, the protocol is run by a DAO with a written Constitution determining the actions that are legitimate. The actions of the ENS DAO are public and transparent. Furthermore, people are not limited to ENS as their service, and can other services such as Unstoppable Domains which provides a variety of blockchain-based addresses. The widespread use of ENS is based on its elegance in solving the problem and by popular convention, so there is no lock-in, as there would be with a DNS system.

In some ways, it would be ideal if the DNS system did not require a universality, but it does. Just as it would create complete chaos if people used multiple addressing systems for physical addresses, the WWW does need a convention for translating IP addresses into domain names. Fortunately, Web3 offers a way to create one authoritative governance body without creating centralized power. That’s where the tomiDNS offers an alternative with long-term legitimacy.

tomiDNS: Built to Address the Addressing Dilemma

The tomiDNS is designed to address multiple problems with the existing addressing systems. In designing tomiDNS, the system architects created a feature set that includes:

• One single address for a domain IP address and multiple cryptocurrency (multi-chain) public key addresses.
• Ownership and control of the Domain Naming Service by a DAO, managed by the netizens of tomiNet.
• Purchasing of domains through an open auction service which discourages domain squatting behaviors and provides a fair chance to acquire domains on the open market.
• Ability to correlate a domain name on the existing WWW with a tomi-based domain name seamlessly.

The tDNS system does not address personal identity and validation of the domains and individual owners. Identity solutions are best addressed using self-sovereign identity standards, which will be discussed in later blogs and developed in accordance with the tomi roadmap.

Each tomiDNS address is represented as an NFT on the Ethereum blockchain. Each NFT includes the domain name functionality and multi-chain capabilities. Initially, each tDNS supports a wide range of currencies, including ETH, BTC, DOGE, SOL and other popular blockchains.

The tDNS system is run by the tomiDNS DAO, which is under development. Initially, the DAO will include only the Pioneer holders who are the initial investors in the tomiNet. Over the course of several years, the DAO will enable more distributed governance to $TOMI holders with weighted voting. The tDNS DAO is empowered to ensure the decentralization of the network, the fair allocation of tDNS names, and the release of different sub-domain names. Initially only the *.tomi domains will be issued by the tDNS and the DAO will determine the release dates of additional top-level domain names in accordance with the maturity and needs of the tomiNet.

The sales of addresses will be through a unique minting process designed to discourage domain squatting and improve the fairness of the system for all participants. The process of tDNS purchases will be as follows:

1. Register the request for purchase at tdns.tomi along with the domain name.
2. If the domain name is available, the initiator mints the domain name at a cost of $70 in $TOMI plus the Ethereum transaction fees. As the original minter, the registering persona will always get 5% of the fees whenever a domain name NFT is purchased.
3. An auction is opened for 24 hours, where anyone can offer a higher price for the domain.
4. If there is no higher bidder than $70, the minter receives the domain name and the funds are distributed as follows:

• 25% to the original bidder (rebate).
• 35% to the tomi core development team.
• 40% to the tomiDAO fund managed by the netizens.

1. If there is a higher bid than $70, the same fund is executed. This means that anyone bidding for a domain name will end up paying 25% to the original minter. This rapidly becomes expensive for domain squatters, who are paying a premium to sit on domains.
2. Furthermore, as mentioned above, in any purchase of the domain NFT, the original minter receives royalties of 5%. The royalties are only available for purchase of the NFT and transfer of the domain to another wallet, not for other income associated with the NFT.

This system is designed to discourage domain squatting through a number of mechanisms. First of all, the cost of $70 is quite a bit higher than regular domains, so it costs quite a bit to squat on the domains.

Secondly, the domain squatter pays the the minter up front, and at every transaction, they pay the minter again. For example, if the squatter buys the domain for $100, and the original minter wants to purchase the domain back from the squatter, the original minter can offer $100, which is $70+$25 (minter’s rebate)+5 (royalties), which is exactly the same as they originally wanted to pay.

For higher-priced domains, there is a higher premium. For example, with a $1000 domain, the original bidder would only gain $70+$250+100 ($420) to bid on the domain from the squatter. This represents a higher risk to the squatter, because the minter might not be willing to pay more than $500, which would yield a loss of $500 to the squatter. This system aligns the potential risk with the potential for gain, so there will still be lively auctions on valuable domains, but every auction will represent the real value and risk of that domain name.

The tdNS DAO and Governance DAO will be able to review the auction process and update the terms and conditions for tDNS purposes in alignment with the spirit of the regulation, which is to create an open and fair market and prevent malicious domain squatting behaviors.