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The Register had an item about this recently [0]. If you read the whole thing and follow the links to the earlier articles it's somewhere in the uncanny valley

The Register had an item about this recently [0]. If you read the whole thing and follow the links to the earlier articles it's somewhere in the uncanny valley between fascinating and horrifying. ICANN is a deeply conflicted organization. Basically they have been on notice about this since 2003 and have done nothing. As of now, they don't have a plan to resolve this. ICANN and any registrar with EU customers providing the whois service are non-compliant with the GDPR. So the EU based registrars have stopped and ICANN is sueing to force them to continue. eta: One of the big reasons ICANN can't do the sensible thing and just discontinue whois is that it is heavily influenced by the big copyright corporations who presently can start enforcement against a domain by lookup in whois. Once whois is gone they will have to use legal process to compel registrars to reveal the identity of domain owners. [0] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/06/europe_no_to_icann_whois/ https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/07/06/europe_no_to_icann_...

guitarbill 8y ago
It does seem like ICANN are delusional idiots. Even their own Non-Commercial Stakeholders Group disowned them when they asked for a moratorium on GDPR: [0] > We do not believe a moratorium on enforcement of the law should be granted to ICANN. [0] https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/gdpr-comments-ncsg-article-29-wp-whois-23apr18-en.pdf https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/gdpr-comments-nc...
- davidgould 8y ago
  > It does seem like ICANN are delusional idiots. Oh yes. I followed the link I gave and read all the linked articles and some of their links and some of the comments on it all. It's quite extraordinary and hilarious.
maze-le 8y ago
>> Once whois is gone they will have to use legal process to compel registrars to reveal the identity of domain owners. Well, sounds like the way it is supposed to work... Besides, the ones they are trying to get with it have TLDs without whois requirement, are at cloudflare or use onion services alltogether.
izacus 8y ago
> that it is heavily influenced by the big copyright corporations who presently can start enforcement against a domain by lookup in whois Why am I not surprised that it's again the copyright leeches that are lobbying to make everything worse? Somehow it seems that they are the most prominent anti-consumer lobbying group these days.
ckastner 8y ago
> ICANN can't do the sensible thing and just discontinue whois Note that this is not about discontinuing WHOIS, but discontinuing the collection of the "technical contact" and "administrative contact". The domain owner's data are still collected, and this collection is still being carried out by the registrar without dispute (page 3, last sentence). The argument is that if ICANN needs to contact someone with regards to a specific domain, contacting the domain owner should be sufficient, so ICANN's argument that they "need" the Tech-C and Admin-C aren't valid. The court agreed with that, but note that at this point, this is only about a preliminary injunction.
- merb 8y ago
  well you basically can write everything into Tech-C and Admin-C and you would still get a valid domain.
  - ckastner 8y ago
    While factually correct, I assume that one is contractually obligated to provide valid details, and then, not doing so would then be a breach of contract.
    - TheSpiceIsLife 8y ago
      You can't be contractually compelled to do something illegal.
      - ckastner 8y ago
        Yep, and that's the argument that the registrar made in this case, and the court agreed. Edit: Well, technically, the court agreed that you cannot be compelled to provide this information. However, I don't see why not one could voluntarily provide this information, in which case providing invalid information would still probably be a breach of contract.
        merb 8y ago
Bromskloss 8y ago
> One of the big reasons ICANN can't do the sensible thing and just discontinue whois is that it is heavily influenced by the big copyright corporations who presently can start enforcement against a domain by lookup in whois. Once whois is gone they will have to use legal process to compel registrars to reveal the identity of domain owners. Doesn't WHOIS typically just show the registrar anyway?
cat199 8y ago
don't doubt that the things you mention are dimensions here, but: a) non-US organizations/gov's have been critical of US hegemony of internet policy for some years - this also is a good way to attack that b) various multinational treaty organizations have been attempting to create agreements where cross-jurisdictional legal actions are valid but haven't been very successful (see also TTIP) - some provisions in GPDR are another instance of this pattern, and would appear relevant here c) logically, hiding website ownership also benefits large media entities as it facilitates a way to obscure ownership information across many domains, potentially making them appear more independent than they actually are disclaimer: dont have direct insight on any of this
- guitarbill 8y ago
  I think you're muddying the waters unnecessarily here. c) this doesn't stand up on closer examination. it was already possible if you had the money using shell/holding companies and the various privacy guard options registrars offer. besides, GDPR is mainly about individual's privacy. b) maybe true, but irrelevant. there are plenty of domain registrars operating in Europe, which have to comply with European laws anyway. a) absolutely, and fair point. however, ICANN's behaviour shows they were right to criticise this artificial hegemony over shared or national critical infrastructure (e.g. country or region-specific TLDs).
gcb0 8y ago
15yrs to do something and do it wrong? seems on line with every other registrar worldwide

guitarbill 8y ago

It does seem like ICANN are delusional idiots. Even their own Non-Commercial Stakeholders Group disowned them when they asked for a moratorium on GDPR: [0] > We do not believe a moratorium on enforcement of the law should be granted to ICANN. [0] https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/gdpr-comments-ncsg-article-29-wp-whois-23apr18-en.pdf https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/gdpr-comments-nc...

davidgould 8y ago
> It does seem like ICANN are delusional idiots. Oh yes. I followed the link I gave and read all the linked articles and some of their links and some of the comments on it all. It's quite extraordinary and hilarious.

maze-le 8y ago

>> Once whois is gone they will have to use legal process to compel registrars to reveal the identity of domain owners. Well, sounds like the way it is supposed to work... Besides, the ones they are trying to get with it have TLDs without whois requirement, are at cloudflare or use onion services alltogether.

izacus 8y ago

> that it is heavily influenced by the big copyright corporations who presently can start enforcement against a domain by lookup in whois Why am I not surprised that it's again the copyright leeches that are lobbying to make everything worse? Somehow it seems that they are the most prominent anti-consumer lobbying group these days.

ckastner 8y ago

> ICANN can't do the sensible thing and just discontinue whois Note that this is not about discontinuing WHOIS, but discontinuing the collection of the "technical contact" and "administrative contact". The domain owner's data are still collected, and this collection is still being carried out by the registrar without dispute (page 3, last sentence). The argument is that if ICANN needs to contact someone with regards to a specific domain, contacting the domain owner should be sufficient, so ICANN's argument that they "need" the Tech-C and Admin-C aren't valid. The court agreed with that, but note that at this point, this is only about a preliminary injunction.

merb 8y ago
well you basically can write everything into Tech-C and Admin-C and you would still get a valid domain.
- ckastner 8y ago
  While factually correct, I assume that one is contractually obligated to provide valid details, and then, not doing so would then be a breach of contract.
  - TheSpiceIsLife 8y ago
    You can't be contractually compelled to do something illegal.
    - ckastner 8y ago
      Yep, and that's the argument that the registrar made in this case, and the court agreed. Edit: Well, technically, the court agreed that you cannot be compelled to provide this information. However, I don't see why not one could voluntarily provide this information, in which case providing invalid information would still probably be a breach of contract.
      - merb 8y ago

Bromskloss 8y ago

> One of the big reasons ICANN can't do the sensible thing and just discontinue whois is that it is heavily influenced by the big copyright corporations who presently can start enforcement against a domain by lookup in whois. Once whois is gone they will have to use legal process to compel registrars to reveal the identity of domain owners. Doesn't WHOIS typically just show the registrar anyway?

cat199 8y ago

don't doubt that the things you mention are dimensions here, but: a) non-US organizations/gov's have been critical of US hegemony of internet policy for some years - this also is a good way to attack that b) various multinational treaty organizations have been attempting to create agreements where cross-jurisdictional legal actions are valid but haven't been very successful (see also TTIP) - some provisions in GPDR are another instance of this pattern, and would appear relevant here c) logically, hiding website ownership also benefits large media entities as it facilitates a way to obscure ownership information across many domains, potentially making them appear more independent than they actually are disclaimer: dont have direct insight on any of this

guitarbill 8y ago
I think you're muddying the waters unnecessarily here. c) this doesn't stand up on closer examination. it was already possible if you had the money using shell/holding companies and the various privacy guard options registrars offer. besides, GDPR is mainly about individual's privacy. b) maybe true, but irrelevant. there are plenty of domain registrars operating in Europe, which have to comply with European laws anyway. a) absolutely, and fair point. however, ICANN's behaviour shows they were right to criticise this artificial hegemony over shared or national critical infrastructure (e.g. country or region-specific TLDs).

gcb0 8y ago

15yrs to do something and do it wrong? seems on line with every other registrar worldwide