[dns-operations] whois in a soundbite

[Shane Kerr]

Andrew and all,

At 2016-03-02 02:08:00 -0500
Andrew Sullivan <ajs at anvilwalrusden.com> wrote:

> On Tue, Mar 01, 2016 at 03:43:01PM +0000, Jim Reid wrote:
> > I can do better in fewer words: whois is utterly useless.   
> 
> If you feel that way, ICANN has a current PDP running that is trying
> to address this.  More tech clue is not bad (best case, maybe I think
> it's safe to resign!).  So if you want to join, you should search
> Google for ICANN RDS.

I haven't volunteered for the ICANN effort even though I have tilted at
WHOIS windmills in the past because, in the words of Kimberly
"Sweet Brown" Wilkins: "Ain't nobody got time for that".

Some more information for the list, based on my brief checking a few
weeks ago.

While it is hard to be certain, since ICANN feels that a 20 page paper
is better than 3 paragraphs of text, it looks like the mandate of the
PDP is actually pretty well-grounded. (Searches for "icann rdap whois"
seem to find relevant PDF, which is how ICANN talks to itself.)

I think that one part of this effort is to get the WHOIS protocol
upgraded to the RDAP protocol that the WEIRDS IETF working group has
produced.

For operators, RDAP should be less operational pain than WHOIS. Fingers
crossed. :)

One major benefit of RDAP over WHOIS is that it is possible to
authenticate clients. Consider that in this environment the
requirements on registrant data can be a lot higher, since it does not
default to public visibility. Of course, this also means that there
need to be associated requirements on consumers of this data (I can
easily imagine a police department that has a single login with the
password on a post-it note above the monitor).

Cheers,

--
Shane