[gnso-rds-pdp-wg] Dangers of public whois

[Hollenbeck, Scott]

Greg, I used the email address example only to address this statement originally sent by Allison (with emphasis added in bold italics for people with HTML-capable mail readers):



“So put your contact address as "123 fake st" and your phone number as "555-555-5555". Make a fake email”



All I’m trying to do is note that this kind of advice can cause real unintended operational consequences for well-meaning registrants who might think it’s a great way to avoid having their PII published via services like WHOIS. It isn’t.



Scott



From: Greg Aaron [mailto:gca at icginc.com]
Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2017 2:20 PM
To: Hollenbeck, Scott <shollenbeck at verisign.com>; 'elsakoo at gmail.com' <elsakoo at gmail.com>
Cc: 'gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org' <gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] RE: [gnso-rds-pdp-wg] Dangers of public whois



No, the RAA validation steps are trivially easy to get around.  You use the example of a fake email address.  Criminals know not to use fake email addresses, and they don’t need to because they can get email addresses for free.  One can sign up for free email accounts anonymously.  There are even underground services that will generate freemail accounts in bulk.  These services cater to criminals such as spammers who need to register lots of domain names.



All best,

--Greg







From: gnso-rds-pdp-wg-bounces at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rds-pdp-wg-bounces at icann.org> [mailto:gnso-rds-pdp-wg-bounces at icann.org] On Behalf Of Hollenbeck, Scott
Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2017 1:57 PM
To: 'elsakoo at gmail.com' <elsakoo at gmail.com<mailto:elsakoo at gmail.com>>
Cc: 'gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org' <gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org>>
Subject: Re: [gnso-rds-pdp-wg] Dangers of public whois



From: allison nixon [mailto:elsakoo at gmail.com]
Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2017 1:35 PM
To: Hollenbeck, Scott <shollenbeck at verisign.com<mailto:shollenbeck at verisign.com>>
Cc: vgreimann at key-systems.net<mailto:vgreimann at key-systems.net>; gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rds-pdp-wg at icann.org>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: [gnso-rds-pdp-wg] Dangers of public whois



>>[SAH] Actually, there *are* requirements to provide valid data and for registrars to perform validation processing:



How do you expect toothless policy to work *on the Internet*? Seriously?



Yes, seriously. Registrars who do not implement the policy are subject to having their accreditation revoked. ICANN has, in fact, revoked or suspended accreditations. Here are two examples:



https://www.icann.org/news/announcement-2-2007-03-16-en



https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/correspondence/serad-to-patel-2-18jul14-en.pdf



worst that can happen when you put in fake whois data is that your domain gets reported, you change "123 fake st" to "124 fake st", and your registrar is satisfied because what more can they possibly do. I know this because I went through this with an old sinkhole domain. It's a total joke. Let's not pretend it's anything more than that.



Not true. A fake email address, for example, can be detected easily when email sent to it (one of the registrar’s validation requirements) gets bounced back. The worst that can happen is that your domain gets put into some non-operational state (“suspend the registration” per the RAA).



Scott

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