Question from Mina L.: I recently looked up the Whois information for my blog’s domain name and noticed that the nameservers pretty much tell everyone which web hosting company I use.
With all the hacking that’s going on these days, I’d rather keep my web host (among other things) a secret if at all possible.
I heard that Godaddy will let you create private nameservers based upon your own domain name, but I can’t find a link or a tool in my Godaddy account to do that. Can you tell me where to go in my Godaddy Control Panel to create my private nameservers?
Rick’s answer: Mina, Godaddy does indeed allow you to create your own private nameservers, and it’s very easy to do. Here’s how:
1 – Log into your Godaddy account.
2 – Click the My Account link at the top of the page, then select Manage My Domains from the drop-down menu. You should now see a list of all the domains that you currently have registered at Godaddy. If you only have one domain registered, that will be the only one listed.
3 – Click on your blog’s domain name to display the Domain Details page.
4 – Select the Settings tab (it is probably already selected by default).
5 – Find the “Host Names” section and click the Manage link. A dialog box will pop up.
6 – Click the Add Hostname button.
7 – In the “Hostname” box, type ns1. followed by your blog’s domain name (be sure to include the period after ns1). For example, if your blog’s domain name was example.com you would type ns1.example.com.
8 – Open the welcome email you received when you opened your web hosting account and copy the IP address for the first nameserver into the Host IP Addresses box.
9 – Click the Add button. You have just finished creating the first custom nameserver address for your domain name.
10 – Repeat the steps above to create the second private nameserver (you need to have two of them). When you get to step 7 use ns2. instead of ns1. Also, be sure to use the IP address for the second nameserver listed in the welcome email.
That’s it. Your private nameservers have been created…
But you’re not done yet! Now you need to “point” your domain name to your newly created private nameservers. Here’s how:
Note: You’ll need to wait at least 24 hours after completing step 10 above before you use the procedure below to “point” your domain to the new nameservers.
1 – After the above-mentioned 24 hours have elapsed, log into your Godaddy account.
2 – Click the My Account link at the top of the page, then select Manage My Domains from the drop-down menu to display the list of domains that you currently have registered at Godaddy.
3 – Click on your blog’s domain name to display the Domain Details page.
4 – Select the Settings tab (it is probably already selected by default).
5 – Find the “Nameservers” section and click the Manage link. A dialog box will pop up.
6 – Click the Edit Nameservers link.
7 – Enter the two private nameservers that you created earlier into the two text boxes (they should begin with ns1. and ns2.).
8 – Click the OK button.
That’s all there is to it Mina. Your domain name now “points” to your private nameservers instead of your web host’s default nameservers.
Note: It can take up to 24 hours for these settings to fully take effect. That means it could take that long for your private nameservers to show up in your domain’s Whois information.
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