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question WHOIS: Even anonymous email contacts are gone?

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capybara

capybaraTop Member
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For a while, privacy-covered domains had this line in the WHOIS data results to send an email to the registrant through a technical intermediary email address.

However, these seem to be gone everywhere now even where it used to be. Namecheap, Dynadot, NameBright, Enom etc. – no registrant email line.

I have been watching a domain registered with Epik which might be getting dropped and I am sure I was seeing this line last week: it was something like [email protected], but now it is gone at Epik as well.

@Rob Monster, could you comment on this? Is there some kind of global WHOIS change coming into effect?

I have read this before, but the article did not indicate anonymized emails were going to disappear.
 
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For a while, privacy-covered domains had this line in the WHOIS data results to send an email to the registrant through a technical intermediary email address.

However, these seem to be gone everywhere now even where it used to be. Namecheap, Dynadot, NameBright, Enom etc. – no registrant email line.

I have been watching a domain registered with Epik which might be getting dropped and I am sure I was seeing this line last week: it was something like [email protected], but now it is gone at Epik as well.

@Rob Monster, could you comment on this? Is there some kind of global WHOIS change coming into effect?

I have read this before, but the article did not indicate anonymized emails were going to disappear.
Hello,

Can you PM me the domain in question so I can take a look at it ?
But for sure, Whois is evolving into RDAP.
Getting a domain owner's email will be much more difficult.. (If not authenticated)

Gube,
 
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Can you PM me the domain in question so I can take a look at it ?
I'd like to keep that a secret even from Epik staff :xf.wink:

But you can check any Epik-registered domain and there is no email contact line now, I can't get it with command line whois, I can't get it with web whois services either.
 
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I don't see any changes at Epik...
https://whois.epik.com - shows all emails as always...

whois example.com under Linux - also shows it.
 
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I don't see any changes at Epik...
https://whois.epik.com - shows all emails as always...

whois example.com under Linux - also shows it.
Still showing here too :
upload_2019-10-14_9-55-58.png


upload_2019-10-14_9-56-44.png
 
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I can see that the data is split into two parts, the brief one does not have it and the more detailed one does, but my CLI whois and many web whois show only the brief one, that is what's happening.

Example, GoDaddy whois on the domain shown by Gube above:

https://www.godaddy.com/whois/results.aspx?domain=skillpart.com
 
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What you call as "brief" - this is from the root Verisign DB. They don't store any contact details.
Each registrar has its own local DB.
 
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At GoDaddy you should check only GoDaddy domains.
 
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A lot of people are just now waking up to the huge problem of WHOIS. I am convinced it was a huge stab in the bank for domain investors. GDPR and some registries (like Donuts) were complicit int his screwing of domainers by making it really hard to reach them so that they can be engaged in after-market discussions.

The project called WhoQ.com was conceived for solving that:

https://www.namepros.com/threads/finalizing-search-for-universal-whois-brand-name-whoq-com.1121692/

The project got briefly stalled earlier this year because RDAP became this huge moving target. Now that RDAP is becoming a predictable outcome, it is back on track.

Updates to follow from @vitigo as we work to fast-track a verified universal WHOIS registry where it becomes easy to find the domain owner of any domain and to reach them without spamming them.

@Sufyan Alani will also play a role here as he is working with many of the ccTLD registries and is our main ICANN intermediary on strategic compliance.
 
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