[gnso-rds-pdp-wg] Principle on Proportionality for "Thin Data"access

[Rob Golding]

> Revoking that data can't stop brute force transfer attempts,

If the status is Transfer Prohibited, then yes it does, as they are 
automatically failed by the registry when the gaining registrar sends 
them.

It's not about whether a domain needs a status, but whether that status 
should be "open to the public" rather than restricted to those who need 
it (registrant via their registrar, authenticated users for specific use 
cases, etc)

> Registrars sell domains in precisely 1 year blocks
> of time.

one-or-more periods of years for most gTLDs, with 2,1,5 being the most 
common at my registrar (in that order)

Creation date I left off, although it's easy to work out from the 
changes to the zone files

Creation date does (in conjunction with the other data) get abused - 
I've had over 30 "contacts" from people trying to sell me seo, websites, 
stationary since registering a variation spelling of a domain on the 
19th May (to help those who keep missing out the final "S" when sending 
an email to me from getting bounces) - 11pm on Monday from an Asian 
callcentre using a UK voip number (now reported to the TPS) being one of 
the most intrusive this week.

Whilst I can't stop the free pens, adwords vouchers, brochures for 
radiator valves and other tat coming through the letterbox based on a 
domain registration, I've even seen _registrars_ doing it :(

I didn't forget, but excluded Updated date - in my experience it's wrong 
at least as much as it's correct -  and my opinion is that data you 
can't trust does more harm than good

 From 2 of my domains:
1. Updated Date: 2017-04-11T23:15:07.0Z
is correct, as that is when I renewed it

2. Updated Date: 2016-01-09T22:25:53Z
is not correct as I changed the nameservers in Dec

To me it looks like it only changes the "updated date" when the _dates_ 
on a domain change, not on other types of updates.

> I actually like the idea of revoking all nameserver data. I like that
> idea the more and more I think about it.

NS information is redundant in "whois", and depending on which whois 
server/system you ask, regularly incorrect - there are a variety of 
reasons for this, including but not limited to:
* registrars don't tidy up
* registries aren't realtime
* 3rd-party systems cache the data
* end-users dont know the difference between whois (service) and "whois" 
being in the name of a website
and so on
I've seen domains where Directi WHOIS has said one thing, a Whois 
website has said another and the actual nameservers were different to 
both of those on the domain at the registry (plus the actual issue I was 
diagnosing was that the zone slaved the nameservers off to yet different 
ns, which is why the A record the client thought should be returned 
wasn't the IP they were seeing)

Use the right tools for the job, and in the case of DNS that's *NOT* 
whois - we'd be doing a global service to the internet by taking them 
out of it.

> SOA data is almost always garbage. 95% of the time I find it useless.

With DNS Zones being mostly automated by hosting control panels, it's 
"variable" as to what goes in there, and SOAs rarely get updated once 
created beyond the serial changing, so sadly yes, it's of limited use 
now

Rob