Wendy Seltzer discusses, in an online article, that ICANN is considering limiting access to registrant information. The problem is, that marketers mine the domain name registration information, then use that information for abusive marketing. One of the possible solutions being considered is to close TCP port 43, thereby completely disabling the whois service.
I get lots of spam at email addresses I have used in domain name registration. I know this problem first hand.
However, the domain name registration information could be useful in blocking spam. I have recently been looking at the domain names used by spammers in the URLs they send. In a very large percentage of cases, the domain name has been very recently registered. Typically, the domain name was registered only a couple of days ago. Most spammers register a new domain name for each campaign, because to do otherwise would allow domain names to be easily blacklisted. I believe one could use a domain name blacklist, together with the domain name registration information, to put up another barrier to spam.
Posted by Doug Sauder at January 7, 2004 07:55 AM