[council] Public Comment: Thick Whois Initial Report - GNSO Policy Development Process

[Glen de Saint Géry <Glen@xxxxxxxxx>]

http://www.icann.org/en/news/public-comment/thick-whois-initial-21jun13-en.htm
Thick Whois Initial Report - GNSO Policy Development Process
Comment / Reply Periods (*)
Comment Open Date: 21 June 2013
Comment Close Date: 14 July 2013 - 23:59 UTC
Reply Open Date: 15 July 2013
Reply Close Date: 4 August 2013 - 23:59 UTC
Important Information Links
Public Comment 
Announcement<http://www.icann.org/en/news/announcements/announcement-21jun13-en.htm>
To Submit Your Comments 
(Forum)<mailto:comments-thick-whois-initial-21jun13@xxxxxxxxx>
View Comments 
Submitted<http://forum.icann.org/lists/comments-thick-whois-initial-21jun13/>
Brief Overview
Originating Organization: GNSO
Categories/Tags:

 *   Policy Processes
Purpose (Brief):

The Generic Names Supporting Organization ("GNSO") Thick Whois Policy 
Development Process Working Group tasked with providing the GNSO Council with a 
policy recommendation regarding the use of 'thick' Whois by all gTLD Registries 
has published its Initial 
Report<http://gnso.icann.org/en/issues/whois/thick-initial-21jun13-en.pdf> 
[PDF, 1.21 MB] for public comment.
Current Status:

The Policy Development Process (PDP) Working Group has published its Initial 
Report<http://gnso.icann.org/en/issues/whois/thick-initial-21jun13-en.pdf> 
[PDF, 1.21 MB] and is soliciting community input on the preliminary 
recommendations contained in the report.
Next Steps:

Following review of the public comments received, the Working Group will 
continue its deliberations and finalize its report for submission to the GNSO 
Council.
Staff Contact:
Marika Konings
Email Staff 
Contact<mailto:Policy-staff@xxxxxxxxx?subject=More%20information%20on%20the%20Thick%20Whois%20Initial%20Report%20%E2%80%93%20GNSO%20Policy%20Development%20Process%20public%20comment%20period>
Detailed Information
Section I: Description, Explanation, and Purpose:

The Thick Whois PDP WG was tasked to provide the GNSO Council with 'a policy 
recommendation regarding the use of thick Whois by all gTLD registries, both 
existing and future'. Following its analysis of the different issues outlined 
in its Charter, including: response consistency; stability; access to Whois 
data; impact on privacy and data protection; cost implications; synchronization 
/ migration; authoritativeness; competition in registry services; existing 
Whois applications; data escrow, and registrar Port 43 Whois requirements (see 
section 5 of the Initial Report), on balance the Working Group concludes that 
there are more benefits than disadvantages to requiring thick Whois for all 
gTLD registries. As a result, the Working Group recommends that:

The provision of thick Whois services should become a requirement for all gTLD 
registries, both existing and future.

The WG expects numerous benefits as a result of requiring thick Whois for all 
gTLD registries. Nevertheless, the WG recognizes that a transition of the 
current thin gTLD registries would affect over 120 million domain name 
registrations and as such it should be carefully prepared and implemented. In 
section 7.2 of the Initial Report, the WG outlines a number of implementation 
considerations. In section 7.3 of the Initial Report the WG also provides other 
observations that emerged from this discussion which while not directly related 
to the question of thin or thick did and should receive due consideration by 
other bodies.

The WG would like to encourage all interested parties to submit their comments 
and suggestions so these can be considered as the WG continues its 
deliberations in view of finalizing its report and recommendations in the next 
phase of the policy development process.
Section II: Background:

ICANN specifies Whois service requirements for generic top-level domain (gTLD) 
registries through the Registry Agreement (RA) and the Registrar Accreditation 
Agreement (RAA). Registries and registrars satisfy their Whois obligations 
using different service models. The two common models are often characterized 
as "thin" and "thick" Whois registries. This distinction is based on how two 
distinct sets of data are managed. One set of data is associated with the 
domain name, and a second set of data is associated with the registrant of the 
domain name.

 *   A thin registry only stores and manages the information associated with 
the domain name. This set includes data sufficient to identify the sponsoring 
registrar, status of the registration, creation and expiration dates for each 
registration, name server data, the last time the record was updated in its 
Whois data store, and the URL for the registrar's Whois service.
 *   With thin registries, registrars manage the second set of data associated 
with the registrant of the domain and provide it via their own Whois services, 
as required by Section 3.3 of the RAA for those domains they sponsor. COM and 
NET are examples of thin registries.
 *   Thick registries maintain and provide both sets of data (domain name and 
registrant) via Whois. INFO and BIZ are examples of thick registries.

The GNSO Council requested an Issue Report regarding the use of thick Whois by 
all gTLD Registries at its meeting on 22 September 2011. The Issue Report was 
expected to 'not only consider a possible requirement of thick Whois for all 
incumbent gTLDs in the context of IRTP, but should also consider any other 
positive and/or negative effects that are likely to occur outside of IRTP that 
would need to be taken into account when deciding whether a requirement of 
thick Whois for all incumbent gTLDs would be desirable or not'.

Following the delivery of the Final Issue Report, the GNSO Council initiated a 
Policy Development Process at its meeting of 14 March 2012.
Section III: Document and Resource Links:

Initial Report on the Thick Whois Policy Development 
Process<http://gnso.icann.org/en/issues/whois/thick-initial-21jun13-en.pdf> 
[PDF, 1.21 MB]

Working Group Workspace - https://community.icann.org/x/whgQAg
Section IV: Additional Information:
N/A
________________________________

(*) Comments submitted after the posted Close Date/Time are not guaranteed to 
be considered in any final summary, analysis, reporting, or decision-making 
that takes place once this period lapses.


Glen de Saint Géry
GNSO Secretariat
gnso.secretariat@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://gnso.icann.org