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Why does Vigil care who runs my DNS?

Lesson 7 of 10 in Your Wi-Fi And Router

DNS is the internet's phone book. If someone changed your router to use theirs, they can send you to fake sites. If you don't recognize the name Vigil shows, check your router's DNS setting.

Why It Matters

Every time you type a website name, DNS looks up where to send you. Whoever runs it decides where you end up, so a bad one can quietly send you to fake sites.

What To Do

  1. Look at the DNS name Vigil shows. Your internet provider, Google, Cloudflare and Quad9 are common, trusted ones.
  2. If you don't recognize it, open your router's settings and find the DNS setting, usually under Internet, WAN or DHCP.
  3. Set it back to automatic, or to a provider you trust.
  4. If you didn't change it yourself, also change your router's admin password and update the router.

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  2. My Wi-Fi is open or uses WEP. What do I do?
  3. How do I find my router's model?
  4. My router has known security holes. Now what?
  5. Something is open to the internet. Is that bad?
  6. What is UPnP and should I turn it off?
  7. My internet address is on a blocklist. Am I hacked?
  8. My Wi-Fi is slow or unsteady. What helps?
  9. Why didn't my router answer the connection test?