Re: [ga] ICANN Board sells out to US Gov't

[George Kirikos <gkirikos@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

--- Danny Younger <dannyyounger@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Forget about bottom-up policy development.  Forget
> about the work of the WHOIS Task Force.  Forget about
> privacy rights that are being embraced on a worldwide
> basis.
> 
> The USG has dictated what WHOIS policy will be. 

WHOIS was a divisive issue. While privacy advocates are well
intentioned, they were unrealistic to expect that anonymous
registrations would exist that increase costs for law enforcement,
while increasing the protection for scammers, phishers, terrorists and
other malevolent forces operating on the internet.

A Domains By Proxy type compromise is a very low cost alternative for
those who wish to have an intermediary act as a representative. My
proposal of a "Legal Representative" contact is very similar, and is
consistent with what is being done in German (.de).

Privacy advocates always talk about the "European Privacy Directives"
but it's really a myth that it means anonymous WHOIS.

http://www.denic.de/en/faqs/alle_faqs/index.html#section_98

"Why are other people permitted to see my data, for example my address,
in the whois query?	 
 	
This data has been rendered public in the whois query for some very
good reasons.

Firstly, it is important to be able to contact you if ever there are
any technical difficulties caused by your domain or its use, which
might lead to problems for others. Of course, it would normally be your
provider who would sort out such technical problems for you, but that
does not affect publication of your data. It may happen that your
provider is partly to blame for the technical difficulties and,
ultimately, you, the domain holder, will be held liable (and that
includes liability for any legal consequences).

Secondly, your data must be made public, so that, if your domain is the
source of an infringement of somebody else's rights, it will be
possible to establish against whom to proceed, if need be.

There is another angle you should consider. In registering a domain and
using it, for instance as the address for a website, you as a rule
become the provider of a media service which prescinds your usual
privacy considerations. There are special laws that apply here and they
require all providers of such services to provide a masthead disclosing
their name and address. So, since everyone can see who you are here
anyway, there would be no point in DENIC keeping your data
confidential.

Against this background, incidentally, the German data-protection
authorities have expressly approved of the publication of personal data
in the whois query. Further information on this subject is to be found,
for example, in the thirteenth data-protection report by the government
of the German federal state of Hesse (sections 9.2 and 9.3) and also in
its fifteenth data-protection report (section 8.7).

If you do not want to have your address made public, the only option
you have is to get the domain registered by someone else whom you
trust. This other person will then be the legal domain holder instead
of you, and their address will, of course, be made public in the whois
query."

Sincerely,

George Kirikos
http://www.kirikos.com/