[gnso-rds-pdp-wg] For WG Review - Redlined Problem Statement

Wed Aug 24 22:58:04 UTC 2016

If another anecdote is helpful, it took me all of one Google search to find a website which claims to be able to perform up to 2,500,000 WHOIS queries in as little as 5 days: https://www.whoisxmlapi.com/bulk-whois-lookup.php

Another result was for an API that could perform 500 queries, free of charge, in as little as 15 minutes: https://jsonwhois.com/pricing

I have not used either service, but it appears to be possible to perform bulk WHOIS queries without having to enter a CAPTCHA.

- Ayden

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [gnso-rds-pdp-wg] For WG Review - Redlined Problem Statement
Local Time: August 24, 2016 11:44 PM
UTC Time: August 24, 2016 10:44 PM
From: gregshatanipc at gmail.com
To: stephanie.perrin at mail.utoronto.ca
gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org

Anecdotally, as a regular user of WHOISes, I would say that most if not all WHOIS access pages have "Captchas" or other bot-defenders. Not a direct answer to your question, perhaps, but at least an observation.

GregBot

On Wed, Aug 24, 2016 at 6:38 PM, Stephanie Perrin <stephanie.perrin at mail.utoronto.ca> wrote:

I too would like to heed Chuck's advice, but have a burning question: Do registries have any way of distinguishing between bots and people, in their citing of stats? If so, how? Could some kind of authentication protocol do this?

thanks

Stephanie

On 2016-08-24 17:42, Ayden Férdeline wrote:

I’m going to heed Chuck’s advice, but just to respond briefly to your message, Elaine, the number of queries you cited does not necessarily translate into human beings performing these searches. So to your comment that, “clearly people aware of whois are using it” – sure, but what is not clear to me from the figures you have extracted is how many unique individuals we talking about.

- Ayden

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [gnso-rds-pdp-wg] For WG Review - Redlined Problem Statement
Local Time: August 24, 2016 10:28 PM
UTC Time: August 24, 2016 9:28 PM
From: elaine at donuts.email
To:
gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org

I love statistics.

Registries must self report whois look up data. https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/registry-reports
For example, in .com April 2016 ALONE
“Whois” Queries In Millions 15,000.3
Web-based Whois 6,960,159

Clearly people aware of whois are using it.

On Tue, Aug 23, 2016 at 10:57 PM, Greg Shatan <gregshatanipc at gmail.com> wrote:

I've taken a deeper look at this 5% (or 8%) "awareness" number that is being bandied about.

This is a misuse of the data. The question did not ask about awareness of WHOIS. The answer cannot be cited to demonstrate awareness of WHOIS; to do so is misleading. The more I look at the data, the less appropriate it is to cite as if it answers this question. As Mark Twain once said, "There are three kinds of lies. Lies, damned lies, and statistics."

My primary conclusion after looking at the data is that it is useless to prove anything about "awareness of WHOIS."

My secondary conclusion is that, even if one were to attempt extract some understanding of use of WHOIS (not even awareness, which is impossible), relying solely on the WHOIS subset is inappropriate and likely a significant underestimation of those who used WHOIS.

First, this is a follow-up question to a users who had "tried to identify who created a particular website" (not "who owns a particular domain name," which would more likely lead to the use of WHOIS, since "who created a particular website" may have nothing to do with the question of domain ownership.

Those who had tried were asked "What did you use to figure this out?" (i.e., figure out who "created a particular website"). It's unclear but possible thaqt only a single answer was allowed, even if the user used multiple tools. The fact that 5% or 8% chose to list their use of WHOIS to see who "created a particular website" (not "who owned a particular domain name") proves nothing about awareness of WHOIS among those who used other tools.

Notably, WHOIS as an answer is grouped with other "Specific Site Search" answers - the rest being Google, Baidu, GoDaddy, DNS records and "other specific site search mentions." (The fact that "WHOIS" is listed as a "specific site search" is enough to make one question the validity of the analysis.)

Of those who tried to figure who created a particular site, the greatest number turned to search engines -- not surprising among general users, as search is often the primary tool used to find out anything  on the Internet. That does not in any way demonstrate their lack of awareness of WHOIS.

Also, the WHOIS answer likely undercounts those who actually used WHOIS. There are other answers that may also refer to WHOIS, some with answers nearly as high as those who expressly identified WHOIS as the "specific site" they searched:

Domain/IP Address search (5% in 2015, 5% in 2016)
Online/Internet tools (Unspecified) (0%, 1%)
Using specific sites that classify/provide information on sites (5%, 2%)

Check registration/if it’s registered/certificate (2%, 2%)
Research (Unspecified) (4%, 1%)
GoDaddy (0%, less than 1%)
TOTAL 16%, 11%

It's impossible to know how many of these refer to WHOIS, but even a minority would double the percentage in each year.

Finally, it's worth noting that the number who answered the same question with the answer "Google" were 10% in 2015 and 14% in 2016. It would be ludicrous to say that this indicates 10% "awareness" of Google in 2015 and 14% "awareness" of Google in 2016. Yet people somehow people feel comfortable applying this characterization to the WHOIS answer. I think this is a strong indication that Mark Twain was right.

On Wed, Aug 24, 2016 at 12:55 AM, Winterfeldt, Brian J. <BWinterfeldt at mayerbrown.com> wrote:

+1 Susan also.

Brian J. Winterfeldt

Co-Head of Global Brand Management and Internet Practice

Mayer Brown LLP

bwinterfeldt at mayerbrown.com

1999 K Street, NW

Washington, DC 20006-1101

[202.263.3284](tel:202.263.3284) direct dial

[202.830.0330](tel:202.830.0330) fax

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New York, New York 10020-1001

[212.506.2345](tel:212.506.2345) direct dial

On Aug 23, 2016, at 12:37 PM, Kiran Malancharuvil via gnso-rds-pdp-wg <gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org> wrote:

+1 Susan.

Kiran Malancharuvil
Policy Counselor
MarkMonitor
[415.222.8318](tel:415.222.8318) (t)
[415.419.9138](tel:415.419.9138) (m)
www.markmonitor.com

-----Original Message-----
From: gnso-rds-pdp-wg-bounces at icann.org [mailto:gnso-rds-pdp-wg-bounces at icann.org] On Behalf Of Susan Kawaguchi
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2016 9:35 AM
To: Volker Greimann; gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org
Subject: Re: [gnso-rds-pdp-wg] For WG Review - Redlined Problem Statement

Volker,

I completely disagree with your statement most registrants do not even what whois isŠ. I might agree with most internet users do not know what registration data is or where to find it but a good portion of domain names are registered to commercial entities who completely understand the whois and use it daily for domain name management.

I am sure you receive inquiries about whois from some registrants but I would guess the vast majority of registrants understand whois.
Susan Kawaguchi
Domain Name Manager
Facebook Legal Dept.

On 8/23/16, 9:27 AM, "gnso-rds-pdp-wg-bounces at icann.org on behalf of Volker Greimann" <gnso-rds-pdp-wg-bounces at icann.org on behalf of vgreimann at key-systems.net> wrote:

I tend to agree. Most registrants do not even know what whois is...

Volker

Am 23.08.2016 um 18:17 schrieb Rob Golding:
Are you suggesting that registrants do not have a vested interest in
an
RDS
system?
Correct - I believe they have a vested interest in there not being an
RDS system

Rob

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