ENS: Decentralized Domains

If you’re reading this post, then you’ve already interacted with and used the internet’s Domain Name System (DNS). The DNS is, in it’s purest form, a look-up table that takes a human readable string, such as http://google.com, and converts it into a numeric IP address that routes to the website’s location on the internet.

A Blockchain Naming System (BNS) provides essentially the same service as DNS, however, there are two key differences. Firstly, a BNS will point to a blockchain address unlike the DNS which points to an IP address. This means that payments can be sent directly to a person’s BNS domain (human.eth) without needing to enter their full alpha-numeric blockchain address (0x123456….). If we think of this in terms of our previous example, this is akin to entering google.com instead of its IP address when you want to visit that website. Ultimately, the point of this system is to simplify the user experience. Importantly, however, this has implications for building sites and applications, which we’ll discuss later on. Secondly, BNS can provide a decentralized, user-controlled, and censorship-resistant alternative to the traditionally centralized DNS, if designed properly. Similar to DNS, BNS domains can expire, be renewed, and sold to other parties depending o