Alias not working for reddit

Marci

Hi forum

I added reddit.com to an alias which I am using to route traffic through my default gateway (most of the traffic goes through a VPN). I need to do this because reddit blocks me when I am accessing it through VPN.

Now the situation is that sometimes I can access reddit but sometimes I am still blocked and I have no idea why.
I tested if my setup works by adding ipchicken.com to the alias and it showed my IP correctly.

Any idea would be welcome

johnpoz

@Marci said in Alias not working for reddit:

reddit.com

is hosted off a cdn, there are lots of IPs.. They could change.. they have a really short ttl, I show 300 seconds. Are you resolving or forwarding - when you forward your ttls could be much shorter, etc.. And then when go look it up again its different.

Aliases only update every 5 minutes by default.. So yeah its possible your going to a different IP then what the alias has in it..

Marci

@johnpoz Thanks for your reply. I did dig @1.1.1.1 reddit.com. A a few times during the day and at least this always showed me the same set of four IPs:

; <<>> DiG 9.18.18-0ubuntu0.22.04.2-Ubuntu <<>> @1.1.1.1 reddit.com. A
; (1 server found)
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 52567
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 4, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 1

;; OPT PSEUDOSECTION:
; EDNS: version: 0, flags:; udp: 1232
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;reddit.com.			IN	A

;; ANSWER SECTION:
reddit.com.		168	IN	A	151.101.65.140
reddit.com.		168	IN	A	151.101.129.140
reddit.com.		168	IN	A	151.101.193.140
reddit.com.		168	IN	A	151.101.1.140

;; Query time: 55 msec
;; SERVER: 1.1.1.1#53(1.1.1.1) (UDP)
;; WHEN: Fri Mar 01 15:23:48 CET 2024
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 103

johnpoz

@Marci what is in your alias? Look in your table under the diagnostic menu

And btw www.reddit.com resolves to an IP outside of those

;; ANSWER SECTION:
www.reddit.com.         10445   IN      CNAME   reddit.map.fastly.net.
reddit.map.fastly.net.  23      IN      A       151.101.21.140

Which is different from where I do the query from - the above was from a vps I have, this was from my current home connection

;; ANSWER SECTION:
www.reddit.com.         3253    IN      CNAME   reddit.map.fastly.net.
reddit.map.fastly.net.  992     IN      A       146.75.77.140

And if you just hit reddit.com in a browser it moves you to www.

--2024-03-01 08:31:44--  http://reddit.com/
Resolving reddit.com (reddit.com)... 151.101.65.140, 151.101.129.140, 151.101.193.140, ...
Connecting to reddit.com (reddit.com)|151.101.65.140|:80... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 301 Moved Permanently
Location: https://reddit.com/ [following]
--2024-03-01 08:31:44--  https://reddit.com/
Connecting to reddit.com (reddit.com)|151.101.65.140|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 301 Moved Permanently
Location: https://www.reddit.com/ [following]
--2024-03-01 08:31:44--  https://www.reddit.com/
Resolving www.reddit.com (www.reddit.com)... 146.75.77.140
Connecting to www.reddit.com (www.reddit.com)|146.75.77.140|:443... connected.

That IP for www. is not in the IPs that is returned for just reddit.com

Marci

@johnpoz Thanks a lot for your comment @johnpoz
I added www.reddit.com, reddit.com and reddit.map.fastly.net to my alias. In the table it shows me the following IPs:

IP Address 	
146.75.121.140 	
151.101.1.140 	
151.101.65.140 	
151.101.129.140 	
151.101.193.140 	
199.232.189.140 	
2a04:4e42::396 	
2a04:4e42:200::396 	
2a04:4e42:400::396 	
2a04:4e42:600::396

But somehow this must incomplete. I just tried to open www.reddit.com and it did not work. In the error message it shows the IP of my VPN provider...