“Site-Lookup Service Foils Fraud” is Ryan Singel’s Wired News writeup about OpenDNS. Ryan and Kevin Poulsen, senior editor at Wired, publish 27BStroke6, a blog about security and privacy, so they grokked what we’re doing — putting some new intelligence into DNS.

Ulevitch’s seven-person startup is an attempt to revolutionize a layer of the internet’s architecture in order to clean its underbelly of scammers and spammers.

One important feature which is not yet available, but will be soon, is self-service control over the DNS settings. Ryan’s article, understandably, doesn’t mention this capability, since it’s not yet live.

The point? We’re going to put more control in your hands, so if you want to turn off features like typo correction or phishing prevention, you’ll be able to. Account management is the top priority now, to help demonstrate the power of control over your DNS. We think transparency and control will show you (not just tell) that we’re making the right choices. (UPDATE: July 17, 2006: try the preferences out. First step, with more to come. November 7, 2006: Set up an OpenDNS account.)

I encourage you to read the article for yourself. Having worked to explain what we do via our website, it’s rewarding to read an external description of OpenDNS that makes a lot of sense. Lots of people are reading the article and submitting excellent questions: we’ll be adding to the FAQ today.

I’m inspired by Simon Phipp’s post “Freedom to Leave” [via Tim Bray]. Simon’s talking about the openness of technology formats and standards, and reminds us all:

The fastest way to send early adopters packing is to make your cool new toy a roach motel.

Though we’re not about data formats, OpenDNS is against lock-in, too. We are asking you to choose OpenDNS, for various benefits. We’re confident that you’ll be happy with our DNS service. If you don’t agree, you’ll make another choice…and there’s nothing we could or would do to stop you.

DNS is easy to change (see for yourself), it’s under your control, and you have a choice.

P.S. I’ve felt this way before, though Simon (and others, like John Hagel) are more convincing.