Re: Is WHOIS going to go away?

[Mark Andrews <marka () isc org>]

You have a logic fail.  This fails because it STILL depends on the DNS for the zone working. 

-- 
Mark Andrews

> On 22 Apr 2018, at 07:27, Lyndon Nerenberg <lyndon () orthanc ca> wrote:
>
>
> > On Apr 21, 2018, at 1:58 PM, bzs () theworld com wrote:
> >
> > That's actually an excellent point and counterpoint to my suggestion
> > to move the WHOIS information into DNS RRs.
> >
> > But backup and failover are reasonably well understood technologies
> > where one cares. Registrars could for example cache copies of those
> > zone records and act as failover whois servers.
>
> Instead of putting the contact info directly into the DNS, put pointers to the locations of the data instead. I.e. 
> whois moves off dedicated ports and hardwired servers and into zone-controlled SRV records:
>
> _whois._tcp.orthanc.ca SRV 0 0 43 orthanc.ca.
>                       SRV 5 0 43 backup.otherdomain.example.com.
>
> This gives each zone control of the information they want to export (by directing whois(1) to what they consider to 
> be authoritative servers).
>
> The domain owners themselves could control the information they chose to expose to the public, through the SRV 
> records, and the information they chose to publish in the whois servers those records point at.  If the domain owner 
> is happy with their (say) registrar providing that information, they would just point the appropriate SRV record at 
> the registrar.  This is no different from how people handle email outsourcing via MX records.
>
> The idea that whois is in any way authoritative is long gone.  Those who want to hide have been able to do that for 
> ages.  (I think I pay $15/year to mask some of the domains I control.)  But for law enforcement, a warrant will 
> always turn up the payment information used to register a domain, should the constabulary want to find that 
> information out.  And for court proceedings, whois data is useless.  (I speak from $WORK experience.)
>
> --lyndon