I fear that the option "recursion_desired" <https://atlas.ripe.net/doc/measurement-creation-api/> does not work as expected. Here was my experiment. I registered a new domain name which never appeared before, d7b16b2a97627e8ccbcccf93e773ec3f.cosmogol.fr. Because of its unreadability, there is zero chance it has ever been in a DNS cache. I then ask Atlas probes to dig it, with "recursion_desired" set to false: {'definitions': [{'query_class': 'IN', 'use_probe_resolver': True, 'af': 4, 'query_argument': 'd7b16b2a97627e8ccbcccf93e773ec3f.cosmogol.fr', 'query_type': 'TXT', 'type': 'dns', 'is_oneoff': True, 'recursion_desired': False, 'description': 'DNS resolution of d7b16b2a97627e8ccbcccf93e773ec3f.cosmogol.fr'}], 'probes': [{'requested': 10, 'type': 'area', 'value': 'WW'}]} But all the probes got the content of this TXT record! Measurement #1034372 if you want to check (unfortunately, this parameter is not displayed in <https://atlas.ripe.net/atlas/udm.html?msm_id=1034372>). It seems wrong, they should all have retrieved an empty answer (here, with dig, the behaviour I expected): % dig +norecurse @MYSERVER TXT d7b16b2a97627e8ccbcccf93e773ec3f.cosmogol.fr ; <<>> DiG 9.8.4-rpz2+rl005.12-P1 <<>> +norecurse @relay1 TXT d7b16b2a97627e8ccbcccf93e773ec3f.cosmogol.fr ; (2 servers found) ;; global options: +cmd ;; Got answer: ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 33141 ;; flags: qr ra ad; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 8, ADDITIONAL: 21 ;; OPT PSEUDOSECTION: ; EDNS: version: 0, flags: do; udp: 4096 ;; QUESTION SECTION: ;d7b16b2a97627e8ccbcccf93e773ec3f.cosmogol.fr. IN TXT ;; AUTHORITY SECTION: fr. 165392 IN NS d.ext.nic.fr. fr. 165392 IN NS d.nic.fr. ...