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Field Report № 04
DNS Security
Measured data, July 9, 2026

What DNSSEC? It's nearly nonexistent among the Fortune 500

DNSSEC signs a domain's DNS records so resolvers can cryptographically verify the answers they get, closing the cache-poisoning and spoofing holes that plain DNS leaves wide open. It takes signing keys in the zone (DNSKEY) and a matching DS record at the parent to anchor them to the global chain of trust. We checked every Fortune 500 company for both, resolving through validating public DNS.

DNSSEC barely registers

11%
53/500 companies
publish DNSKEY records
53 of the 500 companies sign their apex zone at all. The other 447 leave their DNS unsigned.
89%
47/53 of those
validate end-to-end
The rest are unanchored islands of security or a bogus chain that a validating resolver rejects outright.
47
companies out of 500. That is how many of the largest firms in America deploy DNSSEC that actually validates all the way to the root. For everyone else, a spoofed DNS answer is indistinguishable from a real one.

From signed to validated, across all 500

Publishes DNSKEY records (signs the zone)10.6% · 53
Anchored at the parent (DS record)9.4% · 47
Chain of trust validates (secure)9.4% · 47

How the signers set it up

A signed zone picks a signing algorithm. Modern deployments use elliptic curve (ECDSA/Ed25519), while older ones still run big RSA keys. And signing is only half the job: without a DS record at the parent the zone is an island, and a broken signature makes it bogus, unreachable for anyone who validates.

Signing algorithms of 53 signed zones
ECDSA P-256
41
RSA/SHA-256
11
ECDSA P-384
1
Chain of trust of 500 surveyed
Secure (validates)
47
Island (no DS)
6
Bogus (broken)
0
42
of the 53 signed zones use modern elliptic-curve keys: smaller, faster signatures than legacy RSA. The fewbogus domains are the real hazard: their chain is broken, so strict resolvers refuse to resolve them at all.

53 companies with a DNSSEC footprint

Every company whose zone is signed or anchored. 47 validate end-to-end, 6 are unanchored islands, and any tagged bogus have a broken chain that validating resolvers reject.

secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 1
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP384SHA384
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 2
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · RSASHA256
keys · 4
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
secure ds
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
island
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
chain · no parent DS
island
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
chain · no parent DS
island
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
chain · no parent DS
island
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 3
chain · no parent DS
island
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
chain · no parent DS
island
alg · ECDSAP256SHA256
keys · 2
chain · no parent DS