A distributed data storage system that includes endpoint nodes, gateway nodes, and one or more gateway name servers. A gateway name server receives from clients resolution requests to resolve to a gateway node and resolves the resolution requests to a gateway node address of a gateway node. A gateway node receives client requests to access an endpoint node and redirects the requests to endpoint nodes identified by a gateway node whose address was resolved to by a gateway name server. An endpoint node receives from a client a retrieval request to retrieve data based on being redirected to the endpoint node. When a retrieval request is received and the endpoint node stores the data, the endpoint node sends the data to the client. When a retrieval request is received and the endpoint node does not store the data, the endpoint node forwards the retrieval request to another endpoint node.