[CentOS] Chrony

Fri May 8 12:06:42 UTC 2020
Anand Buddhdev <anandb at ripe.net>

On 08/05/2020 13:46, Jerry Geis wrote:

Hi Jerry,

> I just happened to notice this morning in /var/log/messages:
> 
> chronyd[1299]: Selected source 207.244.103.95
> 
> host 207.244.103.95
> 95.103.244.207.in-addr.arpa domain name pointer
> dns-e.wdc-us.hosts.301-moved.de.
> 
> Just curious why my machine in Indiana (USA) is asking for time in Germany.
> Wouldn't it use something closer ?

Lesson #1: do NOT take PTR records at face value. They can be wrong.

Lesson #2: in this case, look again. The company may be German, but the 
host chrony selected appears to be in the USA (wdc-us).

If you look up this IP address in RIPE NCC RIPEStat service, you'll see 
that it also geolocates to USA:

https://stat.ripe.net/207.244.103.95

Geolocation isn't perfect either, but the combination of "wdc-us", the 
Geolocation data, the fact that this IP address block was allocated by 
ARIN, and that your chrony selected it, all point to the fact the NTP 
server is in fact, close to you.

Regards,
Anand Buddhdev