Updating Whois info. Whois Responsible?

[Grrilla]

I'm having another aggravating experience w/ a registrar that I have had past problems with, but before I jump on their case, just want to double check on procedure.

After you have submitted new contact info to the registrar, isn't their responsibility to update the whois. Am I missing something. I had an unsuccessful transfer w/ a name. I went to the registrar site, double checked all of my contact info- all correct - I had changed it several months ago, but when I checked the whois on the name, and several other names I have w/ this registrar, all of the whois info was outdated, including an old obsolete email address. Can anyone shed some light on this? -and- Just what is the method a registrar uses to update the whois contact info?

 

[Riceman]

On RRP based names such as .com and .net the whois info is stored at the registrar level which means each registrar maintains this information. For EPP based names(.us, .biz, .info etc) they use a "thick" registry which means the registry stores the contact info. Most registrars will show via whois the "registry" information of a given domain name. In certain cases registrars like enom will show their "internal version" of the whois when you do a lookup on their site vs pulling down what the registry shows which is why every one in a while you may have a domain name out of sync with enom whois and what the registry shows.

 

[Mark]

This is a Great topic IMHO - I Have had some problems in this area Myself !

 

[Dave_Z]

Let me guess: NetSol?

 

[Mark]

lol - Not for me in this case ... It's Been several , several years since I used a direct account there - lol !

There are a few smaller regs out there that don't offer the option of "Auto" updating the whois when pushed - I had a handful last month with someone using my info to "Spam" Search Engines with Domains/Emails I formerly owned (That were still in my name) - I hunted the joker(s) Down (Sent them a Nasty Gram stating what I could possibly do - seeing the whois was still mine ! ) .... All is well again for me -

 

[dna]

As usual, Riceman is giving out bad information.
Enom does have 2 versions of the whois.
The version that they tell you
and the version they tell the rest of the world.
I had 4 domain names at ENOM that i had purchased
from namepro members moondog and edu.
Checking with whois.cc and whois.net, I noticed that
while i was listed as the technical, administrative and billing
contacts, edu and moondog were still listed as the registrants.
But when i logged into my ENOM account, I found that i was properly
listed as the registrant. This made me nervous as the
registrant is officially the domain name owner. When I
asked ENOM about this they assured me that nothing was wrong
with the whois. Not trusting their assurances, I started
transfering these names to Godaddy. And who did ENOM
tell Godaddy was the registrant of my domains, moondog of course.
I was easily able to fix this
problem at Godaddy and now whois.cc and whois.net
properly list me as the registrant.

 

[Grrilla]

It's always interesting how one man's poison can be another man's Patron.
One area in which I was hoping to gain some insight, is in the area of the actual physical mechanics of the process. ie manual changes-automatic changes.

My above problem, relates to Pool. Although all of my contact info was updated months ago, a name that was recently picked up, is showing my old info in the whois. I am trying to understand how the system works, so that I can pin down where breakdowns of this nature happen, and avoid future occurences. For example, is it possible that there is more than one db pool, (no pun intd) at Pool, and the wrong one kicked in and sent the partner registrar erroneous info? or Is it possible that the partner registrar had old info on me and plugged that in? Do registrars act as the primary informational conduit to the Registry, making updates, or is it possible for the Registry to have had some residual whois info that inadvertantly got plugged in? (Improbable, but germaine to the "mechanics" that I am trying to explore.