Whois Accuracy

Regulations

With the signing of the latest Registrar Accreditation Agreement with ICANN (RAA 2013), a mandatory policy for the verification of data in the Whois directory is implemented. All registrars must strictly comply with these regulations.

The complete policy is available on the official website of ICANN.

This policy is mandatory for holders of generic domains (.com, .net, .org, .info…) and new generic domains or ngTLDs (.eus, .blog, .futbol, etc.). However, it does not affect territorial extensions, such as .es.

Summary of the regulations

The new regulations primarily imply two actions for holders of generic domains and ngTLDs:

• Email validation: every new registration, incoming transfer, or change of holder data (first name, last name, or email) requires the email address to be verified.
• Domain suspension (clientHold): if the email is not validated within a maximum period of 15 days, the domain will be suspended until the verification is completed.

The clientHold status indicates that the domain stops responding at the DNS level, so associated services (website, email, etc.) will stop working temporarily.

However, the holder does not lose the domain: they will be able to continue renewing it annually, but as long as the clientHold status lasts, the domain will not be functional until the email verification is completed.

Whois data validation procedure

The validation of the holder's email address is mandatory in the following cases:

• Change in holder data: first name, last name, or email (see detailed procedure in the ? Manuel : Change of contact for a domain).
• New domain registration.
• Incoming domain transfer.
• Annual Whois data verification email returned or not delivered, as established in the Whois Reminder Policy (WRDP).

WRDP: ICANN establishes a Whois data reminder policy according to which a summary of the holder's Whois data must be sent to the domain holder once a year, before the domain expires.

Validation will be performed by clicking the link included in the verification message sent to the holder's email.

Important points

• Validation is performed only once per email. Once validated, if it is used in new registrations or transfers, it will not be necessary to validate it again, unless the annual reminder message is returned or an error occurs.
• Validation is not retroactive: it only applies to new registrations or changes; existing domains are not automatically validated.
• If validation is not performed within a maximum period of 15 days, the domain will stop working at the DNS level. If it is validated after a suspension, there will be DNS propagation before it becomes operational again.
• Non-validation only affects domains for which the notice has been issued. If the same email is used for other previous domains, these will not be affected.

Notices during the validation process

During the holder's email validation process, the following notices are sent:

1. Day 0: The first validation email is sent to the domain holder.
2. Day 5: The validation email is resent to the holder, with a copy to our client.
3. Day 10: The validation email is sent again to the holder, with a copy to our client.
4. Day 13: The validation email is sent again to the holder, with a copy to our client.
5. Day 16: If validation has not been completed, the domain is suspended, and both the holder and the client are notified.