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Whois: Whois Database
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Before the Web, Whois was strictly an Internet service used to query a host and find out if a certain user was registered on that system. Originally developed by the military, others followed with their own Whois databases, which provide white pages directories. See finger.
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The ICANN WHOIS policies conflict with national privacy laws, including the EU Data Protection Directive, which require the establishment of a legal framework to ensure that when personal information is collected, it is used only for its intended purpose. At a recent ICANN meeting, George Papapavlou, a representative from the European Commission stated that if the original purpose of the WHOIS database is purely technical, the rights of access to and collection of that information pertain solely to that original purpose. Speaking at the "Freedom 2.0" conference held by EPIC in May 2004, Vinton G. Cerf, the President of ICANN, confirmed directly that the original purpose of WHOIS was indeed purely technical. As personal information in the directory is used for other purposes and ICANN's policy keeps the information public and anonymously accessible, the database could be found illegal according to many data protection laws including the European Data Protection Directive.
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Whois-IP 1.0.7 will include InterNIC support that may ... work with the auto-DNS lookup. This will allow Whois-IP to get the hostname of an IP and find more infos thru InterNIC databases.
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ICANN Committee Endorses Privacy Safeguards for WHOIS Data The ICANN WHOIS task force has issued its Final Report on WHOIS Services. The task force endorsed a proposal that would remove registrants' mailing addresses, phone and fax numbers and email addresses from the publicly available WHOIS database. EPIC submitted comments to ICANN supporting this proposal to limit access to registrants’ information. For more information, see EPIC’s WHOIS page. (Mar. 12, 2007)
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Many whois servers exist worldwide. For example, there is a European whois database at RIPE (Reseaux IP Europeans) in Amsterdam. An individual can query the whois command via telnet by telnetting to a host offering the whois service. An individual can query the Internics whois database using the Web, or an individual can query the Internic database by sending an email to mailserv@ds.internic.net. A freeware program developed by Luc Neijens, called Cyberkit, is ... available at http://www.ping.be/cyberkit/index.html.
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The Data in the USP WHOIS database is provided by USP for information purposes, and to assist persons in obtaining information about or related to a domain name registration record. USP does not guarantee its accuracy. By submitting a WHOIS query, you agree that you will use this Data only for lawful purposes and that, under no circumstances will you use this Data to: 1) allow, enable, or otherwise support the transmission of mass unsolicited, commercial advertising or solicitations via e-mail (spam); or 2) enable high volume, automated, electronic processes that apply to USP (or its systems). USP reserves the right to modify these terms at any time. By submitting this query, you agree to abide by this policy.
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