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Anonymous Domain Registration for Protecting Privacy?
morpheus 2001 asks: "I'm a recent graduate working in a corporate environment. I would to register a domain for a blog, but want to protect my privacy. I would also like keep my employer (and others in my professional circle) from realizing that I am the author by checking the WHOIS for the domain. Under the current ICANN rules, anyone who registers a domain must provide their personal contact information. There are several domain registrars who claim to allow one to register a domain anonymously. They do this by registering in their name, but 'guarantee' the I retain ownership of the domain and can transfer it at any time to another registrar. Has anyone used an anonymous registrar? Did you have any problems retaining ownership? Do you have any recommendations for a reputable registrar? Is this a really stupid idead and bound to cause trouble?"
If all you want is to prevent them from tracing it back to you in particular (but don't care about anonymity from legal pursuits, and you aren't going to use that domain to do bad stuff) have you considered simply getting it registered under a friend's name? Anybody you can trust will do, really, and it's a lot more trustworthy than any of these companies that will "register it for you"... (imho)
Daniel
Carpe Diem
. . . make sure the reverse DNS for whatever box your hosting this on doesn't come back with something like yourname.com, as well.
You could just fill in jibberish. This might give you some hassles if someone tries hijacking your domain, but if it's just a weblog just for a few strangers to look at you might not care. Depends on how important anonimity is to you, if your talking about inside dirt about some major coporation, I'd use blogspot or geocities and only post from internet cafes (freenet if you're really paranoid). If your just bitching occasionally about your boss at the video store then just use some fake whois info.
Keep in mind whoever you register your domain with still has your billing information. If you say something that's legal but still pisses off a corporation or scientologists or something, they might use the lawsuit trick, where they sue you for libel, forcing the registar to hand over your identity, then they drop the lawsuit.
think about it: anonymous domain registration is a boon to all the spammers out there for the exact same reasons you want the anynomyity -- no real way to trace back to the source of their pollution. i think a different approach is warranted in this case, something like asking your mom to register the domain using her maiden name and giving you a piece of paper saying that you hold all rights to (and responsibilities for) the domain.
yeah, yeah, okay...
he wants to know how to apply for a domain while maintaining his privacy, so i posted a link to google on "fake id" (as in how to make / obtain fake identification documents). the implication being that he could make / obtain a fake id then apply for a domain.
let my post serve as a lesson for others:
never mix sleep deprivation and attempts at subtle humor
If you are going to set up a blog, and you are concerned about your employer finding out about it, then don't do it. You should assume that if they care, they can find out who is behind the blog.
They can, you know. They just claim that the blog has some DMCA prohibited content, get a takedown notice, go to the ISP, and find out where the wire leads. Even if you host on some East Elbownian server, they can find out who is behind it if they care badly enough.
You are concerned that your employer might find out. OK, you can do one of two things that can work:
But trying to do this anonymously and hoping your boss doesn't find out is a losing proposition.
www.eFax.com are spammers