# Dnsmasq service - should it be disabled?

**URL:** <https://discourse.pi-hole.net/t/dnsmasq-service-should-it-be-disabled/15889>\
**Category:** General\
**Created:** [January 6, 2019, 8:57pm UTC](https://discourse.pi-hole.net/t/dnsmasq-service-should-it-be-disabled/15889 "2019-01-06T20:57:09Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 10

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**Author:** ![borpin](https://discourse-cdn.pi-hole.net/user_avatar/discourse.pi-hole.net/borpin/32/2648_2.png) [@borpin](https://discourse.pi-hole.net/u/borpin)\
**Post date:** [January 7, 2019, 2:44pm UTC](https://discourse.pi-hole.net/t/dnsmasq-service-should-it-be-disabled/15889/10 "2019-01-07T14:44:47Z")

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Hi @jfb - no worries.

The issue I can see is that, as this is a service that is started via `update-rc.d` a normal 'disable' does not work as it leaves the various run level files hanging around as seen by `ls -l /etc/rc?.d/*dns*`

To remove those you need to execute `update-rc.d -f dnsmasq remove`.

Secondly, _disabling_ a service simply stops it from running at boot, but does leave open the possibility of it being initiated by another service. To stop the possibility of that happening, a

```auto
systemctl mask dnsmasq.service

```

is required.

This then removes it from the output of a `systemctl status` and avoids confusion.

Thanks for your help.

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