Whois is going away?

[GreyGeek]

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/o...s-obamas-fault

ICANN’s core values have been compromised since it’s no longer subject to U.S. jurisdiction and the First Amendment. Who.is, ICANN’s worldwide database of who owns which website and how to contact them, soon won’t be publicly available anymore, despite strong objections from U.S. officials. Businesses and law enforcement rely on these open records to track down scammers, pirates, child pornographers, and other bad actors online.

How many times over the years have you used nslookup and whois to find out who owns a website or what their IP address is? Apparently that ability is going away. Access to the who.is database won't be publicly available any more. Are there plans to monetize it? We may wish.

whois 74.125.124.139

#
# ARIN WHOIS data and services are subject to the Terms of Use
# available at: https://www.arin.net/whois_tou.html
#
# If you see inaccuracies in the results, please report at
# https://www.arin.net/public/whoisinaccuracy/index.xhtml
#


#
# The following results may also be obtained via:
# https://whois.arin.net/rest/nets;q=74.125.124.139?showDetails=true&showARIN=false&showNonArinTopLevelNet=false&ext=netref2
#

NetRange:       74.125.0.0 - 74.125.255.255
CIDR:           74.125.0.0/16
NetName:        GOOGLE
NetHandle:      NET-74-125-0-0-1
Parent:         NET74 (NET-74-0-0-0-0)
NetType:        Direct Allocation
OriginAS:       
Organization:   Google LLC (GOGL)
RegDate:        2007-03-13
Updated:        2012-02-24
Ref:            https://whois.arin.net/rest/net/NET-74-125-0-0-1



OrgName:        Google LLC
OrgId:          GOGL
Address:        1600 Amphitheatre Parkway
City:           Mountain View
StateProv:      CA
PostalCode:     94043
Country:        US
RegDate:        2000-03-30
Updated:        2017-12-21
Ref:            https://whois.arin.net/rest/org/GOGL


OrgTechHandle: ZG39-ARIN
OrgTechName:   Google LLC
OrgTechPhone:  +1-650-253-0000 
OrgTechEmail:  arin-contact@google.com
OrgTechRef:    https://whois.arin.net/rest/poc/ZG39-ARIN

OrgAbuseHandle: ABUSE5250-ARIN
OrgAbuseName:   Abuse
OrgAbusePhone:  +1-650-253-0000 
OrgAbuseEmail:  network-abuse@google.com
OrgAbuseRef:    https://whois.arin.net/rest/poc/ABUSE5250-ARIN


#
# ARIN WHOIS data and services are subject to the Terms of Use
# available at: https://www.arin.net/whois_tou.html
#
# If you see inaccuracies in the results, please report at
# https://www.arin.net/public/whoisinaccuracy/index.xhtml
#

Also, nslookup may be history as well

$ nslookup google.com
Server:         127.0.0.1
Address:        127.0.0.1#53

Non-authoritative answer:
Name:   google.com
Address: 74.125.124.100
Name:   google.com
Address: 74.125.124.101
Name:   google.com
Address: 74.125.124.102
Name:   google.com
Address: 74.125.124.113
Name:   google.com
Address: 74.125.124.138
Name:   google.com
Address: 74.125.124.139

[jglen490]

Some actual information about ICANN and the "whois" protocol.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WHOIS

ICANN proposal to abolish WHOIS
The Expert Working Group (EWG) of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) recommended on 24 June 2013 that WHOIS should be scrapped. It recommends that WHOIS be replaced with a system that keeps information secret from most Internet users, and only discloses information for "permissible purposes."[30] ICANN's list of permissible purposes includes domain-name research, domain-name sale and purchase, regulatory enforcement, personal data protection, legal actions, and abuse mitigation.[31] Although WHOIS has been a key tool of journalists in determining who was disseminating certain information on the Internet,[32] the use of WHOIS by the free press is not included in ICANN’s proposed list of permissible purposes.
The EWG collected public input on the initial report until 13 September 2013. Its final report was issued on 6 June 2014, without meaningful changes to the recommendations.[33] ICANN is now in the "process of re-inventing WHOIS," working on "ICANN WHOIS Beta."[34][35]

[GreyGeek]

The "Final Report" of June 6, 2014 is here.
On page 109 is the recommended model, the SRDS. Basically, it gives gov control over access of any and all data except "basic" data, what ever that is.

Meeting universal needs for registration data with a basic public data set, while also
reducing data that is public by default and authenticating those who access gated data.

Basic. Domain name and IP? Gated. address, abuse, dates, about everything else? Gatekeepers? Government bureaucrats.

One thing for sure, with such a bureaucratic overlord, the cost of buying and maintaining a domain name will increase significantly. Say goodby to $5/mo web servers. Even with the vast pool of IPv6 addresses available I suspect that the number of web servers will significantly decrease when this policy is implemented. And, what always happens when the government gets its hands on anything? Complexity and paperwork goes up, time to get things done increases significantly, and the quality always goes down.

Maybe it's time for the US to re-create its own ACANN system and allow on it only those websites that allow full information to be publicly available, thus eliminating those services that hide website owners from the public. It's the number one way politicians and corporations create anonymous websites.

[TWPonKubuntu]

...
Maybe it's time for the US to re-create its own ACANN system and allow on it only those websites that allow full information to be publicly available, thus eliminating those services that hide website owners from the public. It's the number one way politicians and corporations create anonymous websites.

GG;
While that sounds good "on paper", my suspicious side says the an American system will still be run by TPTB, with its attendant fees, policies and "oversight" bureau...

I've been watching the mesh network movement in a few (too few) cities around the US. It doesn't rely on an internet backbone for connection, but also lacks widespread connections and access to an independent data archives. Time will tell if this is going to expand. I'm crossing my fingers and looking at the hardware needed to implement this on a local basis.

[whatthefunk]

WhoIs is kind of worthless. Its very easy to obscure your info. whois info for one of my sites:

refer:        whois.verisign-grs.com

domain:       COM

organisation: VeriSign Global Registry Services
address:      12061 Bluemont Way
address:      Reston Virginia 20190
address:      United States

contact:      administrative
name:         Registry Customer Service
organisation: VeriSign Global Registry Services
address:      12061 Bluemont Way
address:      Reston Virginia 20190
address:      United States
phone:        +1 703 925-6999
fax-no:       +1 703 948 3978
e-mail:       info@verisign-grs.com

contact:      technical
name:         Registry Customer Service
organisation: VeriSign Global Registry Services
address:      12061 Bluemont Way
address:      Reston Virginia 20190
address:      United States
phone:        +1 703 925-6999
fax-no:       +1 703 948 3978
e-mail:       info@verisign-grs.com

[dibl]

Agree with whatthefunk -- these guys are not exempt from law enforcement or legal service, but their customers have paid to hide from you and me:

Njalla

PRQ

Domains By Proxy

[kc1di]

Well it was a handy tool a few years ago but as some have pointed out it's about useless today with means of hiding IP's etc from public view. when I checked on my own stuff it showed many links but none were my real address. VPNs are great

[Bings]

Can get whois privacy feature for free if you go to the right registrars. A private organisation with a massive database of everyone's details, it's only ever going to end with them selling the data I guess.

[GreyGeek]

Whois and nslookup still have their uses. Not everyone hides their details, and when sites do that tells me they have something to hide. Hiding is very prominent on political websites, especially since certain Rep & Dem websites were outted as being registered by folks who were not.

However, I use it to populate/etc/hosts with IP & domain names for important sites like this one, and gov sites.

[Bings]

Whois and nslookup still have their uses. Not everyone hides their details, and when sites do that tells me they have something to hide. Hiding is very prominent on political websites, especially since certain Rep & Dem websites were outted as being registered by folks who were not.

Over here, the .uk registry doesn't allow you to hide your details if you're a business. Article on it. I like to not have my details on my domain just for personal privacy rather than having "something to hide" per se.

However, I use it to populate/etc/hosts with IP & domain names for important sites like this one, and gov sites.

What is the purpose of doing that?

[GreyGeek]

As an emergency DNS, if the DNS service goes down or gets poisoned, etc

[Bings]

Another article on ICANN

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/0...-response-gdpr

[dibl]

Another article on ICANN

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/0...-response-gdpr

Interesting -- thanks Bings!

Actually, in my eyes the "two tiered" system being kicked around does not seem like a disaster. I'm a person who has had a registered domain and an educational (genealogy) website for 8 or 9 years now. So my name, address, email address, and home telephone number have been publicly accessible via whois for that long. I'm not a person who lays awake at night worrying about which bad guys in the world might find my personal identifying information. Do I get a LOT of spam on my 25-year old aol.com address? Yes, I do.

However, I also understand that there are malicious and vicious internet users whose conduct is motivated only by avarice or political agendas, who are focused on separating people from their money or their understanding of the truth. So there does need to be a means to identify exactly what person or organization is using the internet for such purposes. But, like other aspects of our system of justice and legal conduct, it seems like there could be an empowered intermediary who has the responsibility to hear the basis of why the privacy of a domain owner needs to be ripped off for inspection, and the authority to do so when justified. In the USA and other developed nations, we've long had formal law enforcement capability to identity and, if appropriate, prosecute the source of old-fashioned mail sent through the postal system. The individual power that the original whois service provided was indeed nice to have -- no question. But, as noted in my previous post, it's long been susceptible to compromise by anyone with the money to pay for one of the "privacy protection" domain obfuscation services. So I don't see a disaster in formalizing a system that provides, in the first instance a modicum of privacy to the domain owner, and in the second instance a means of investigation and shutdown of domains conducting anti-social operations.

[GreyGeek]

Thoughtful and well written reply. It triggered a solution, which is: keep the Whois database open and NOT have it controlled by a bureaucracy (what could possibly go wrong? Hint: politicalization of the IRS) AND, have a database of the name and IP address of of those who execute the Whois command. Sure, it could be spoofed, but so have domain name registrations.



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[TWPonKubuntu]

Thoughtful and well written reply. It triggered a solution, which is: keep the Whois database open and NOT have it controlled by a bureaucracy (what could possibly go wrong? ...

Hmmmm... That sounds a lot like Facebook(r)...

So, how do you prevent bots from scraping that database? Can this even be done?

I see no easy solution and by that I mean one which offers privacy protection. One option is to only use trusts to hold websites. Yes, that increases the cost, a lot. Trusts can also be broken, but they are a means to put another layer between Your information and those who want to collect it. I think (my opinion) that privacy is expensive and growing more so.