The Domain Name System has often been referred to as the “internet’s phone book,” translating human readable text into machine readable IP addresses.

Yet, DNS does far more than power the internet’s basic infrastructure, and this had led one company — Infoblox Inc. — to build a set of modernized tools around the protocol that could have major implications involving security and cloud operations in the future.

A key acquisition and an enhanced DDI platform — which consolidated DNS, dynamic configured host protocol and IP address management into a single platform — have positioned Infoblox as a major player in secure, cloud-managed network services.

“It’s how cloud scale and cloud native integrate into an older paradigm like DNS; that’s the evolution of this DDI concept,” said John Furrier, co-host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio. “It’s this abstraction layer that creates innovation opportunities but also takes away a lot of the complexities around managing DNS. The CXOs, the senior people have to understand that DNS cannot be overlooked.”

Furrier spoke with Stu Miniman, co-host of theCUBE, during the Infoblox Next Level Network Experience event, in two separate analyst segments. They discussed DNS support across distributed environments, Infoblox’s integration of a newly acquired company’s technology, and future naming system enhancements. (* Disclosure below.)

Watch the first of the two analyst conversations below:

Managed at scale from cloud

When Infoblox launched its BloxOne DDI service in 2019, the new tool was positioned as a cloud-managed service that would help enterprises extend network capabilities to remote offices. Fast forward to 2020, when much of the world is working remotely, and network services can now be managed at scale from the cloud across distributed environments.

“Now the cloud is such a big piece of what’s going on,” Miniman said. “What Infoblox has with their DDI stack is something that customers need. I need to make sure my identity and my IP is something that I can manage wherever I am in all of these environments.”

In November, Infoblox acquired SnapRoute Inc., a cloud native network operating system provider. SnapRoute makes it easier to automate network provisioning and provides Infoblox with a key boost for development of secure access service edge, or SASE, capabilities. As more internet of things devices become connected to network infrastructure, endpoint security will be vitally important.

“In today’s day and era, things change so fast and the amount of work that needs to be done is too large,” Miniman said. “That’s why automation needs to be front and center, and you see Infoblox with some of their new solutions, especially leveraging SnapRoute, take advantage of the modern way that people need to do things.”

The are signs of growing interest in products and services for cloud native DNS. Amazon Web Services Inc. has its own DNS service — Route 53 — which routes users to cloud infrastructure inside or outside of AWS. And Kuma, a new Cloud Native Computing Foundation project, provides a universal DNS service discovery API that abstracts out services running on multiple platforms as though they were in one cluster.

“I think there will be a new naming system on how to deal with different scale across multicloud,” Furrier said. “You’re going to start to see new levels of innovation. This might not be your grandfather’s networking company that comes out of the woodwork; it might be a cloud app.”

Watch the second of the two analyst conversations below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Infoblox Next Level Network Experience event. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the Infoblox Next Level Network Experience event. Neither Infoblox Inc., the sponsor for theCUBE’s event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: Infoblox Inc.