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WHOIS Policy Review – WHOIS Review

Objectives of the WHOIS Review

"ICANN … commits to enforcing its existing policy relating to WHOIS, subject to applicable laws.

Such existing policy requires that ICANN implement measures to maintain timely, unrestricted and public access to accurate and complete WHOIS information, including registrant, technical, billing, and administrative contact information."

ICANN will organize a review of "WHOIS policy and its implementation to assess the extent to which WHOIS policy is effective and its implementation meets the legitimate needs of law enforcement and promotes consumer trust."

Timeline of Review

  • First review to be conducted one year from the effective date of the Affirmation of Commitments
  • Further reviews to be conducted no less frequently than every three years

One review of the WHOIS Policy has been completed to date and planning is underway for the second review team to be convened in late 2016.  A call for volunteers is planned for release in October 2016.

Review Call for Volunteers Review Team Announced Final Report Issued Board Action Implementation Details
WHOIS 1 Jun 2010 30 Sep 2010 11 May 2012 8 Nov 2012

The graphic below illustrates phases and status of each review - a Circle arrow 360 indicates that all activities within a given phase have been completed.  The chart that follows the graphic provides further details of key activities and milestones within each phase – you can view these details by clicking on each of the phases in the graphic.  The table also contains links to relevant documents.

WHOIS

WHOIS
PhaseActivityDescriptionStart DateDocuments
Assemble Review TeamCall for VolunteersPublic announcement inviting volunteers to submit application1 Jun 2010
Appointment of AoC review team membersAppointment of review team members based on AoC requirements30 Sep 2010
SO/AC RequirementsSO/AC Requirements for Review Team Volunteers1 Jun 2010
Applications receivedApplications received for WHOIS12 Sep 2010
Call for VolunteersCall for Independent Experts, Law Enforcement Representatives and Global Policy Experts26 Jul 2010
Applications receivedApplications received for WHOIS independent expert30 Sep 2010
Plan ReviewTerms of ReferenceDocument outlining the scope of work adopted by the review team8 Jun 2010
VariousAocReview team activities and detailed information available on the community wiki20 Oct 2015
Conduct ReviewRFP for external consultantRequest for Proposals for WHOIS Consumer Trust Research10 Jul 2011
Final Report of External ConsultantReport published by UserInsight11 May 2012
Draft ReportDraft report posted for public comment5 Dec 2011
Final ReportFinal report submitted to ICANN Board11 May 2012
Board ActionBoard receipt of the Final ReportBoard action and resolution23 Jun 2012
Public comment on Final ReportFinal report posted for public comment11 May 2012
Board action on review team recommendationsBoard action and resolution8 Nov 2012
Plan ImplementationPlan implementationPlan implementation1 Sep 2012
Implement ImprovementsDetails of implementation and periodic updatesInformation available on the ICANN website31 Dec 2015

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Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."