Jay's on to a very big money spinner with this one, IMO.

I guess some of the biggest users of this service will be those who feel their TM has been infringed, and want to look for other instances to show to a WIPO panel that the domainer has a history of such registrations.

This in turn will probably make a few domainers think really hard about the benefits of a hidden proxy whois.

Be nice for registrants to get a 20% share of the search fee Jay

http://blog.domaintools.com/2007/10/...arch/#comments

http://www.domaintools.com/registrant-search/

Can't wait to hear who the first person is who ponies up enough dosh to search the 2,669,852 records for 'Domains by Proxy, Inc'

Not the first time it has been done though it sounds like domaintools version is a lot better than what was around previously. I wonder if we'll see more use of proxy whois as a result?

http://blog.domaintools.com/2007/10/registrant-search/

snoopy's got a poll here as to whether you agree the tool is a good idea or not:
http://www.domainstate.com/showthrea...threadid=82739

Sorry fizz, didn't realize there was already a thread, I'll try and add that thread to this one rather than delete it so it will add a poll.

Hmmmm, COM/NET whois records virtually allways include a statement regarding TOS terms of no automated usage as well as copyright.

Seems to be there is a lawsuit here should a registrar want to pursue it. Espicially for those who have their own registrar and are not publishing privacy records ....

For example:

The data contained in GoDaddy.com, Inc.'s WhoIs database,
while believed by the company to be reliable, is provided "as is"
with no guarantee or warranties regarding its accuracy. This
information is provided for the sole purpose of assisting you
in obtaining information about domain name registration records.
Any use of this data for any other purpose is expressly forbidden without the prior written
permission of GoDaddy.com, Inc. By submitting an inquiry,
you agree to these terms of usage and limitations of warranty. In particular,
you agree not to use this data to allow, enable, or otherwise make possible,
dissemination or collection of this data, in part or in its entirety, for any
purpose, such as the transmission of unsolicited advertising and
and solicitations of any kind, including spam. You further agree
not to use this data to enable high volume, automated or robotic electronic
processes designed to collect or compile this data for any purpose,
including mining this data for your own personal or commercial purposes.

Please note: the registrant of the domain name is specified
in the "registrant" field. In most cases, GoDaddy.com, Inc.
is not the registrant of domain names listed in this database.

Registrant:
GoDaddy.com, Inc.

Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. (http://www.godaddy.com)
Domain Name: GODADDY.COM

Domain servers in listed order:
CNS1.SECURESERVER.NET
CNS2.SECURESERVER.NET
CNS3.SECURESERVER.NET

****************************************************
See Business Registration Listing
****************************************************
Copy and paste the link below to view additional details:
http://who.godaddy.com/whoischeck.as...in=GODADDY.COM

I put my name in there and it showed me almost exactly how many domains I have reged within half a second.

Looks like bad news for domainers who own a lot of typos (that's almost everyone).

Domaintools could find themselves in a bit of a pickle trying to play to both sides of the domain divide by introducing this one.

Originally posted by Chad
I put my name in there and it showed me almost exactly how many domains I have reged within half a second.

Looks like bad news for domainers who own a lot of typos (that's almost everyone).

Yuck! .. This thing sucks .. There must have been a previous beta test or a prototype out there before .. as the last C&D i recieved had a large number of my domains noted by the attorney .. i didn't like that at all and was scatching my head wondering where he got that info from ...

My name brings up this result but i aint paying $332 to see it ... it is wrong in any case if that THING is referring to me ...

<<< We found 884 different domain names with 1,974 cached whois records that fit your search.

Order this report for $332.00 >>>

This is going to be an excellent tool for lawyers. Nice going Jay.

"millions of full whois records dating back to the year 2000...."

if you are considering privacy listing on your domains.... too late

Originally posted by DomeBase
the data goes back to 2001.

don't try to change anything now.

Domey ... So you dont think that there is any hope cant change a damn thing its all to late ...

Originally posted by Americar
Domey ... So you dont think that there is any hope cant change a damn thing its all to late ...

that's the rub, ain't it

you don't go with privacy WHOIS and people looking to buy your domains or laywers prospecting or whatever will cite a large number of domains as "warehousing" or "siting on them" or "cybersquatting" -- regardless of whether any of them actually infringe on anything

you do go with privacy WHOIS and people will be able to get through that through historical information and/or legal stuff -- and then they will cite the privacy as "you have something to hide" or "you must be scum" or "cybersquatter" -- regardless of whether you have anything to hide or not

Do I understand some of the TOS/Privacy violation comments here correctly by assuming that

Mega Lawsuits

can result out of this mis/adventure?

What is the purpose of the WHOIS data?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Final task force report on the purpose of Whois and of the Whois contacts
15 March 2006

"This document is the Preliminary Task Force Report on the Purpose of Whois and of the Whois Contacts. It has been produced by the Whois Task Force of the GNSO, and comprises the task force's work on tasks 1 and 2 of its terms of reference. On 2nd June, 2005, the GNSO Council agreed terms of reference ( http://gnso.icann.org/policies/terms-of-reference.html ) for the Whois Task force. These terms of reference required the Whois Task Force to complete the following tasks regarding the purpose of Whois: (1) Define the purpose of the WHOIS service in the context of ICANN's mission and relevant core values, international and national laws protecting privacy of natural persons, international and national laws that relate specifically to the WHOIS service, and the changing nature of Registered Name Holders."

Formulation 1: -- "The purpose of the gTLD Whois service is to provide information sufficient to contact a responsible party for ***a particular*** gTLD domain name who can resolve, or reliably pass on data to a party who can resolve, issues related to the configuration of the records associated with ***the*** domain name within a DNS nameserver." -- supported by the representatives of the following constituencies: Registrar Constituency; Registry Constituency; NonCommercial Users Constituency.

Formulation 2: -- "The purpose of the gTLD Whois service is to provide information sufficient to contact a responsible party or parties for ***a particular*** gTLD domain name who can resolve, or reliably pass on data to a party who can resolve, technical, legal or other issues related to the registration or use of ***a*** domain name." -- supported by representatives of the following constituencies:

http://gnso.icann.org/issues/whois-p...rt-15mar06.htm

**added