Why Is Internic Restricting WHOIS Queries?

Ötti asks: "I just noticed that InterNIC started to restrict access to its WHOIS database. That puts sites like Allwhois into an awkward situation, since they cannot provide lookups anymore. That might sound like a minor problem to those of you located in the U.S., but in other parts of the world it is very convenient to have a unified interface to all registrars in the world. And once again it raises the ultimate questions: Who owns the informations on domain name holders? Why is it not publicly accessible and how can organizations like ICANN help to improve matters?"

Comments

InterNIC Restrictions?

[AtariDatacenter]

I noticed that a WHOIS on my existing domain (with network solutions) gives only the most basic information. Is this what you are referring to, or something else?

Whois Server Version 1.1

Domain names in the .com, .net, and .org domains can now be registered
with many different competing registrars. Go to http://www.internic.net
for detailed information.

Domain Name: DOMAIN-NAME.COM
Registrar: NETWORK SOLUTIONS, INC.
Whois Server: whois.networksolutions.com
Referral URL: www.networksolutions.com
Name Server: NS1.DNS.COM
Name Server: NS2.DNS.COM
Updated Date: 26-jan-2000

>>> Last update of whois database: Sat, 8 Jul 00 04:46:44 EDT

The Registry database contains ONLY .COM, .NET, .ORG, .EDU domains and
Registrars.

Re:InterNIC Restrictions?

[RalphWiggum]

Under FreeBSD, or Solaris or several others, if 'whois' takes the -h flag you can use:
whois -h whois.networksolutions.com domainname
and it will give detailed info.

fwhois on redhat doesn't support it, not sure about other distros

Re:InterNIC Restrictions?

[Andrew Lockhart]

Because of the decentralization of registrars, if you have a domain with NSI you need to use whois.networksolutions.com Whois Server: whois.networksolutions.com if you run whois domainname@whois.networksolutions.com then you'll see the info that you're used to.

Re:InterNIC Restrictions?

[CvD]

Under RedHat you can use the following format:

whois slashdot.org@whois.networksolutions.com

They're screwing up what they got, too

[h2odragon]

I happened to be playing with WHOIS last night, and noticed that one of the (registered) domains I was looking at was showing a different registrar with different queries. That domain is registered with either NSI, or Hughes Electronic Commerce Inc, apparently depending on which server you get out of a round robin load sharing arrangement or something.

I reccomend BW Whois for those who want a whois client that functions like it's supposed to. Nice little perl script that even knows how to strip NSI's "drop dead before using this data" disclaimers.

Re:InterNIC Restrictions? -- Not quite, FleaBSDood

[soren]

FINGER whois, e.g. it utilizes FINGER-like functionality for querying the server, comprende:

:~$ fwhois
usage: fwhois user[@]
:~$

blah.

You wanna know why?

[Wakko Warner]

"Because they fucking can." No other reason. It seems, ever since NSI was privatized, the quality of service has plummeted to earth faster than Amazon's stock price. NSI, now headed by *retarded* one-armed monkeys (they were smart monkeys when the government owned them) is out to see to it that your job, as a network administrator, is made as difficult as they possibly can. That's actually their business model, and it's the reason their stock, even in the face of myriad competitors, each of which doing a better job than NSI at domain registration and pricing, continues to climb.

Retarded, one-armed monkeys, I tell you. Only someting that stupid could come up with the little disclaimer they put before "whois" output.

- A.P.
--

"One World, one Web, one Program" - Microsoft promotional ad

Social Engineering

[a-optic]

Think about it... I love security and this is a good think but if you want information you call can get some whois information from the site. It is still enough to social engineer thinks like password logins .. even r00t if you are good at social engineering ... if you have tech or webmaster's phone number to contact you can easily act like you are from Internic or a place you register. it is all matter of security. Think for a webmaster this is just to protect them a little better.... a little but not much as I saw when i used the service.