A European Informational Website
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On the Internet, the Domain Name System (DNS) associates various sorts of information with so-called domain names; most importantly, it serves as the "phone book" for the Internet: it translates human-readable computer hostnames, e.g. en.wikipedia.org, into the IP addresses that networking equipment needs for delivering information. It also stores other information such as the list of mail exchange servers that accept e-mail for a given domain. In providing a worldwide keyword-based redirection service, DNS is an essential component of contemporary Internet use.