John and all, John, you may very well be right, but do you have any hard evidance that clearly substanciates your claim? My guess is you don't. Other reasons for inaccurate Whois data are also evident, such as failing to update registration data for example, for whatever reason. Wendy's point is still well taken. However the better solution is to adjust what information is displayable in a Whois querry other than by LEA, whom should have full Whois data access. Casual Whois lookups from non LEA's should not have access to ALL whois data or data that is personally identifyable, such as a persons home address or phone number. To not protect personal indetifyable information [ known as PII in legal parlences ] is to expose that registrant to stalking, which has already occured, harrassment, fraud scams of various sorts, ID Theft, and other forms of illegal activities as well as ucerping that registrants civil rights in many countries, and a violation of international law. For instance we have already seen recently how access by an FBI agent, whom was a fraud themselves, to PII lead to several illegal immigration activities as well as ID theft. So the price for open access to Whois data that is personally identifyable information, as you seem to proport John, is far to high and for to risky to far too many, way to easily. -----Original Message-----
From: John Levine <johnl@iecc.com> Sent: Apr 6, 2008 7:02 PM To: Wendy Seltzer <wendy@seltzer.com> Cc: At-Large writ small <alac@atlarge-lists.icann.org>, NA Discuss <na-discuss@atlarge-lists.icann.org> Subject: Re: [At-Large] [NA-Discuss] Community Input Requested on Two Draft Statements from ALAC to the ICANN Board
Speaking for CAUCE, we agree with all of Wendy's comments ...
Trade WHOIS accuracy for WHOIS privacy. When inaccuracy is the way to preserve privacy, it's better than forced accuracy.
... except this one.
The vast majority of bogus WHOIS info is clearly not there for reasons of personal privacy, but rather to hide the identities of perpetrators of phishing, spam, and other kinds of fraud.
R's, John
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