<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<reference anchor="I-D.li-dnsop-response-preprocessing" target="https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-li-dnsop-response-preprocessing-02">
   <front>
      <title>DNS Response Pre-processing Security Guidelines: Awaiting Valid Responses</title>
      <author initials="X." surname="Li" fullname="Xiang Li">
         <organization>Nankai University</organization>
      </author>
      <author initials="Y." surname="Qiu" fullname="Yuqi Qiu">
         <organization>Nankai University</organization>
      </author>
      <date month="February" day="28" year="2026" />
      <abstract>
	 <t>   The security and robustness of the Domain Name System (DNS)
   significantly depend on how resolvers handle received responses.
   Current DNS specifications lack exhaustive and consistent guidance on
   response pre-processing, particularly for malformed or unexpected
   packets.  This specification gap has led to implementation
   divergences and has been shown to introduce security vulnerabilities
   such as DNS cache poisoning, Denial of Service (DoS), and resource
   exhaustion, as detailed in the TUDOOR attack research.

   This document aims to clarify and standardize the behavior of DNS
   resolvers when receiving and initially processing responses from
   upstream servers.  The core proposal is the &quot;Awaiting Valid
   Responses&quot; mechanism, which mandates that a resolver, after issuing a
   query, MUST maintain a defined waiting period to receive a well-
   formed, relevant, and validated response.  During this period, non-
   compliant incoming packets should be discarded, and the resolver
   should continue to wait until a valid response is received or the
   query times out.  This document provides guidance for DNS
   implementers to mitigate security risks arising from flaws in
   response pre-processing logic.

	 </t>
      </abstract>
   </front>
   <seriesInfo name="Internet-Draft" value="draft-li-dnsop-response-preprocessing-02" />
   
</reference>
