Build sites with Impervious
Impervious Registry is an Ethereum registry for buying subdomains under Handshake top-level domains. While ENS prioritizes wallet naming, the Handshake protocol and Impervious registry prioritize DNS — which makes it easier to use Ethereum domains for your website.
Here’s how to connect a website to your Impervious domain in three steps.
(1) Pick a domain to register.
Today, there are 40+ domain extensions available at impervious.domains.
Impervious domains are self-custodied in a wallet and outside of a traditional domain registrar. This can mitigate DNS hijacking risk, which is all too common in crypto. Last week, ~$575k was stolen in this style attack on Curve Finance’s domain.
Verified domain extensions are ‘Locked”, or guaranteed to be forever pointed to the Impervious Registry. These Locked TLDs have been sent to an ownerless address on Handshake for maximum trustlessness.
(2) Add DNS records.
Go to Details and add name records that point to your website.
↳ Add on-chain records by adding A, AAAA, or CNAME records like you normally would. On-chain name records are good for transparency and decentralized nameservers.
↳ Add off-chain records by pointing NS and DS records to a public nameserver like HS Hub or a personal nameserver like Handout. Off-chain name records are good for privacy and gas-less updates.
For more details on Handshake website hosting, review this tutorial.
(3) Secure your domain.
Create your own SSL certificate using DNSSEC with this script. You will generate a TLSA record to add to your on or off-chain nameservers. DNSSEC is more secure (and free) than relying on Certificate Authorities.
That’s it!
Bonus: Access your domain.
To access Impervious domains, any Handshake resolver with HIP-5 support will do. Here are two options we recommend.
↳ Fingertip is a desktop resolver that works with any browser.
↳ Beacon is a desktop and mobile browser. It also works as a mobile resolver with other mobile browsers.
Around the DWeb: TRM Labs
Censorship of DeFi continues to be a hot-button issue, as many DeFi protocols integrate blockchain intelligence provided by TRM Labs. TRM Labs combines on-chain data and real-world investigations to identify financial crime and other harmful activities. This information is used to block wallet addresses from interacting with DeFi protocols. For example, 253 addresses are currently blocked by Uniswap, the largest decentralized exchange in crypto.
For DeFi developers, many are doxxed individuals in the US that could go to jail and choose not to run that risk by using TRM Labs. A concern, however, is that over-compliance by blocking according to proximity can result in massive swaths of innocent users being incorrectly banned. You can follow the conversation as it pertains directly to the Uniswap Interface here.
This Week in Handshake
HS Hub The public Handshake nameserver has launched its own registrar. You can now buy .xp domains at hshub.io/domains.
Impervious For Handshake TLDs issuing subdomains with Impervious, The Shake has created a customizable landing page for anyone to fork. Brand your own landing page and send domain searches directly to your extension rather than to the generic Impervious search page.
https://records/ A selection of on-chain music projects set up on Handshake .records domains.
📈 By The Numbers
🌎 HNS Nodes
📅 DWeb Events
↳ DWeb Camp | Aug 24
↳ HNS @ NamesCon | Sep 2