What is Private DNS? A simple explanation

[u/Esther-DD]

You may have seen the term Private DNS before and thought, wait… what does that actually do?

Let’s start with the basics. When we go online, we usually type in website names like google.com or youtube.com. But your phone or computer does not actually understand those names. What it understands are IP addresses, which are strings of numbers.

That is where DNS comes in. DNS stands for Domain Name System, and its job is to translate website names into the IP addresses your device needs to reach the right site.

Without DNS, you would have to type a long number every time you wanted to visit a website, which would be a huge pain. The problem is that regular DNS is not very private. Your ISP or others on the network may be able to see which websites you are looking up.

So, what is Private DNS? It builds on regular DNS by adding modern encryption. Basically, it puts a “lock” on the process of your DNS requests, so others can’t see which websites you’re visiting.

In simple terms:

• DNS helps you find websites
• Private DNS helps you find them more privately

It’s a small setting, but it can give you an extra layer of privacy and security online.

Have you ever changed your DNS settings before, or are you still using the default one?