Notahacker, I actually wasn't defending it at all. Just offering another perspective for argument's sake. ;) If we even allow anyone to view a whois record, th

Notahacker, I actually wasn't defending it at all. Just offering another perspective for argument's sake. ;) If we even allow anyone to view a whois record, then should it be accurate? So, why not just get rid of whois entirely if it's going to either contain false information or no information at all? I totally agree with you that people shouldn't ben able to email you at-will, just trying to sell you something, sell you a similar domain, or try to switch you into moving to another registrar. (Generally those would fall under email spam, anyway?) There are other reasons why people need to contact site owners, though. Like because of DMCA requests, or maybe even their site is broken, contact form on site broken, or something similar. But again, if the whois data is going to be inaccurate, missing, or just false then why even have it in the first place?