Its chequered security record notwithstanding, the open source software developed at Berkely University to handle name resolution on the internet continues to run slightly over 80 percent of the servers that provide such a service today.
Of a total of 92,245 domain servers which were tested using fingerprinting software, 74,698 run one version or the other of BIND (Berkeley Internet Name Domain), an implementation of the Domain Name System protocols which provides an openly redistributable reference implementation of the major DNS components.
The tests were carried out by the Internet Systems Consortium, a non-profit public corporation which supports the infrastructure of the internet.
BIND and the open source mail transport agent, Sendmail, have both had a long history of security vulnerabilities, yet the usage of both shows no sign of decreasing. Sendmail is estimated to look after the transport of nearly three-quarters of the mail that traverses the internet.
The remainder of the domain name servers enumerated ran Microsoft's implementation of the protocols (14539), TinyDNS (1887), simple DNS (797) and a variety of others (324).