EU Privacy Watchdog To ICANN: Law Enforcement WHOIS Demands "Unlawful" 81
First time accepted submitter benyacrick writes "WHOIS was invented as an address book for sysadmins. These days, it's more likely to be used by Law Enforcement to identify a perpetrator or victim of an online crime. With ICANN's own study showing that 29% of WHOIS data is junk, it's no surprise that Law Enforcement have been lobbying ICANN hard to improve WHOIS accuracy. The EU's privacy watchdog, the Article 29 Data Protection Working Party, has stepped into the fray with a letter claiming that two of Law Enforcement's twelve asks are "unlawful" (PDF). The problem proposals are data retention — where registrant details will be kept for up to two years after a domain has expired — and re-verification, where a registrant's phone number and e-mail will be checked annually and published in the WHOIS database. The community consultation takes place at ICANN 45 in Toronto on October 15th."
Re:Working phone number in whois (Score:5, Funny)
you could always get a Google Voice number and not forward it anywhere (or set it to perma-do-not-disturb) - you'd still be able to browse through voicemails if necessary through an email interface
Bonus points for wasting their time as well as their call charges. Make your answering machine give a lengthy message, such as:
"You have reached the number that you dialed. Please check the number, and try your call again. Your call is important to you. Your patience and perseverance are valuable impediments to your business. Please don't hold. " Repeat that sequence as long as your message allows. A robo-caller will perhaps get confused by the pattern of pauses and statements, and might even bring a human on the line. An actual human will become grumpy and hang up in disgust.
Re:Working phone number in whois (Score:2, Funny)
You have reached an imaginary number. Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and try the number again."
That usually confuses any human on the line.