How to put wildcard entry into /etc/hosts?

Question

I recently wanted to point all subdomains for a test domain, let's say example.com to the localhost. Is there a way to point all requests on *.example.com to resolve to 127.0.0.1

Answer 1

It happens that /etc/hosts file doesn't support wild card entries.

You'll have to use other services like dnsmasq. To enable it in dnsmasq, just edit dnsmasq.conf and add the following line:

address=/example.com/127.0.0.1

Answer 2

Here is the configuration for those trying to accomplish the original goal (wildcards all pointing to same codebase -- install nothing, dev environment ie, XAMPP)

hosts file (add an entry)

file: /etc/hosts (non-windows)

127.0.0.1   example.local

httpd.conf configuration (enable vhosts)

file: /XAMPP/etc/httpd.conf

# Virtual hosts
Include etc/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

httpd-vhosts.conf configuration

file: XAMPP/etc/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

<VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerAdmin [email protected]
    DocumentRoot "/path_to_XAMPP/htdocs"
    ServerName example.local
    ServerAlias *.example.local
#    SetEnv APP_ENVIRONMENT development
#    ErrorLog "logs/example.local-error_log"
#    CustomLog "logs/example.local-access_log" common
</VirtualHost>

restart apache

create pac file:

save as whatever.pac wherever you want to and then load the file in the browser's network>proxy>auto_configuration settings (reload if you alter this)

function FindProxyForURL(url, host) {
  if (shExpMatch(host, "*example.local")) {
    return "PROXY example.local";
  }
  return "DIRECT";
}

Answer 3

use dnsmasq

Assuming that you're using a Debian-based dist(ubuntu, mint..), check if it's installed with

(sudo) systemctl status dnsmasq

If it is just disabled, start it with

(sudo) systemctl start dnsmasq

If you have to install it, write

(sudo) apt-get install dnsmasq

To define domains to resolve edit /etc/dnsmasq.conf like this.

address=/example.com/127.0.0.1

to resolve *.example.com

! You must reload dnsmasq to take effect for the changes !

systemctl reload dnsmasq

Answer 4

Using wildcard for host file is not possible or require complex method.

Go here to get ip address you wanna block https://dnsdumpster.com/

enter domain: example.com then roll down. Click on download xlsx of host. All ip of domain and subdomain is listed here.

Copy ip address from excel column to a txt file name ip_address.txt

First, you need enable firewall:

sudo ufw enable

Second, using this command:

while read -r ip_address; do sudo ufw deny out to $ip_address; done < ip_address.txt}

Note that you need use "out to" to block outbound connect from your pc to ip. If you use use "from" it only block inbound connect from ip to your pc and user still can get access to ip.

Third, test if ufw work by using:

sudo ufw status numbered

When you want remove a rule:

sudo ufw delete <rule-number>

Answer 5

It was a simple question, guys. The answer seems to be "no."

The reason I'm looking for information about this topic is that Google just added lots of new top level domains that seem to be designed for abuse, like .zip and .mov. They only went live five days ago and malicious actors have already set up pages using those domains to steal credentials, install malware, and worse. Leaving aside questions about Google's motivation, it would be very helpful to have a fast and simple way, that doesn't involve either going to some dubious web page to install someone's shiny new security app, which we rilly rilly swear doesn't have any hidden spy features, or spending a decade learning regex fu, to blacklist everything on all of them. For that matter, .biz has existed for twenty-two years and I have yet to see the first legitimate thing that uses it. I'd also like to bitbucket all traffic in either direction for .ads, .adult, .ru, .cn, .kr, .xyz, .za, and .zn. Anything and everything, for that matter, that doesn't use one of the original seven .tlds:

.com .edu .gov .int .mil .net .org

has been 100% sketchy AF since day one and it would be ideal for me, in my own personal use case, on my own computers, to point all of it to 0.0.0.0.