Is WHOIS going to go away?

Tue Apr 24 17:25:19 UTC 2018

The fun problem here is that anonymity, encryption etc - everything that's good and recommended for privacy and security conscious people - gets heavily used, and early adopted, by criminals, the good ones among whom are paranoid about both these at least so they stay out of prison.

If only all registrars and registries would actually act proactively about keeping abuse off their networks. Some do a great job, others do just enough to keep ICANN and the security community off their backs, while still others couldn't care less about either.

If we had this level of proactiveness, the problem of whois going away would be far less of an issue.

________________________________
From: NANOG <nanog-bounces at nanog.org> on behalf of Badiei, Farzaneh <farzi at gatech.edu>
Sent: Friday, April 20, 2018 9:17:21 AM
To: John Levine; nanog at nanog.org
Cc: bzs at theworld.com
Subject: Re: Is WHOIS going to go away?

Dear John,

The days when some in the technical community could just discard others arguments by saying that  "[you] have no idea how the Internet works" have long passed. I will not get intimidated nor will I step back. Old tricks, won't work, it's as old as the dysfunctional WHOIS and will disappear.

Also your last paragraph obliges me to clarify: it's not always a "he" that might be arguing! it's sometimes, though might it be rarely, a "she".

No one asked to protect people from their governments (I have heard this before as well). But also people should not be endangered or even minimally disturbed by making their personal information public. There are many many scenarios when personal information can be abused, and governments might not be involved.

I might not know as much as you do about how the Internet works. But I know one thing: There will be a change. The convenience of security researchers and trademark owners is not going to be set above domain name registrants right to data protection. But I am sure the cybersecurity community can come up with a more creative way of preserving cybersecurity without relying on using personal information of domain name registrants and violating their rights!

Farzaneh

In article <23257.12824.250276.763926 at gargle.gargle.HOWL> you write:
>So you think restricting WHOIS access will protect dissidents from
>abusive governments?
>
>Of all the rationalizations that one seems particularly weak.

Oh, you're missing the point.  This is a meme that's been floating
around in academia for a decade: the brave dissident who somehow has
managed to find web hosting, e-mail, broadband, and mobile phone
service but for whom nothing stands between her and certain death but
the proxy whois on her vanity domain.

If someone makes this argument you can be 100% sure he's parroting
something he heard somewhere and has no idea how the Internet actually
works.

________________________________
From: NANOG <nanog-bounces at nanog.org> on behalf of John Levine <johnl at iecc.com>
Sent: Thursday, April 19, 2018 10:43 PM
To: nanog at nanog.org
Cc: bzs at theworld.com
Subject: Re: Is WHOIS going to go away?

In article <23257.12824.250276.763926 at gargle.gargle.HOWL> you write:
>So you think restricting WHOIS access will protect dissidents from
>abusive governments?
>
>Of all the rationalizations that one seems particularly weak.

Oh, you're missing the point.  This is a meme that's been floating
around in academia for a decade: the brave dissident who somehow has
managed to find web hosting, e-mail, broadband, and mobile phone
service but for whom nothing stands between her and certain death but
the proxy whois on her vanity domain.

If someone makes this argument you can be 100% sure he's parroting
something he heard somewhere and has no idea how the Internet actually
works.

R's,
John