At 4/20/02 4:49 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >One point of clarification. It is *not* a violation of terms and >conditions on the usage of public whois data to use *postal mail* for >solicitations. The ICANN policy only prohibits e-mail, telephone, and >fax bulk solicitations. (see section 3.3.5 of the Registrar Accreditation >Agreement at http://www.icann.org/registrars/ra-agreement-17may01.htm) > >So they can legally mine the public whois and send postal mail >solicitations.
Hmmm, I thought section 3.3.5(b) would cover this case -- it prevents "high volume, automated, electronic processes" from querying the WHOIS, and I assume Verisign/DROA would have to use those to collect contact information. The agreement is a little unclear, I admit (it makes it sound as if the registrar would be the one sending the queries; the sentence could benefit from some grammar editing). But I have always assumed the intent of that section is to prohibit direct mass data mining of the WHOIS, even for postal mail -- otherwise, there would be no reason that I can see for anyone to ever purchase the bulk WHOIS records for $10,000. But maybe I'm wrong: I am not a lawyer, or a grammarian. -- Robert L Mathews, Tiger Technologies "The trouble with doing something right the first time is that nobody appreciates how difficult it was."
