Network Working Group L. Daigle
Request for Comments: 3912 VeriSign, Inc.
Obsoletes: 954, 812 September 2004
Category: Standards Track
WHOIS Protocol Specification
Status of this Memo
This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the
Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for
improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet
Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state
and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004).
Abstract
This document updates the specification of the WHOIS protocol,
thereby obsoleting RFC 954. The update is intended to remove the
material from RFC 954 that does not have to do with the on-the-wire
protocol, and is no longer applicable in today's Internet. This
document does not attempt to change or update the protocol per se, or
document other uses of the protocol that have come into existence
since the publication of RFC 954.
1. Introduction
WHOIS is a TCP-based transaction-oriented query/response protocol
that is widely used to provide information services to Internet
users. While originally used to provide "white pages" services and
information about registered domain names, current deployments cover
a much broader range of information services. The protocol delivers
its content in a human-readable format. This document updates the
specification of the WHOIS protocol, thereby obsoleting RFC 954 [1].
For historic reasons, WHOIS lacks many of the protocol design
attributes, for example internationalisation and strong security,
that would be expected from any recently-designed IETF protocol.
This document does not attempt to rectify any of those shortcomings.
Instead, this memo documents the WHOIS protocol as it is. In some
areas, this document does document particular well known shortcomings
of the WHOIS protocol. The discussion of possible protocols to carry
out these functions, with updated capabilities to address the
Daigle Standards Track [Page 1]RFC 3912 WHOIS Protocol Specification September 2004
shortcomings, is being addressed in a separate IETF activity (CRISP
Working Group).
2. Protocol Specification
A WHOIS server listens on TCP port 43 for requests from WHOIS
clients. The WHOIS client makes a text request to the WHOIS server,
then the WHOIS server replies with text content. All requests are
terminated with ASCII CR and then ASCII LF. The response might
contain more than one line of text, so the presence of ASCII CR or
ASCII LF characters does not indicate the end of the response. The
WHOIS server closes its connection as soon as the output is finished.
The closed TCP connection is the indication to the client that the
response has been received.
3. Protocol Example
If one places a request of the WHOIS server located at whois.nic.mil
for information about "Smith", the packets on the wire will look
like:
client server at whois.nic.mil
open TCP ---- (SYN) ------------------------------>
<---- (SYN+ACK) -------------------------
send query ---- "Smith<CR><LF>" -------------------->
get answer <---- "Info about Smith<CR><LF>" ---------
<---- "More info about Smith<CR><LF>" ----
close <---- (FIN) ------------------------------
----- (FIN) ----------------------------->
4. Internationalisation
The WHOIS protocol has not been internationalised. The WHOIS
protocol has no mechanism for indicating the character set in use.
Originally, the predominant text encoding in use was US-ASCII. In
practice, some WHOIS servers, particularly those outside the USA,
might be using some other character set either for requests, replies,
or both. This inability to predict or express text encoding has
adversely impacted the interoperability (and, therefore, usefulness)
of the WHOIS protocol.
5. Security Considerations
The WHOIS protocol has no provisions for strong security. WHOIS
lacks mechanisms for access control, integrity, and confidentiality.
Accordingly, WHOIS-based services should only be used for information
which is non-sensitive and intended to be accessible to everyone.
Daigle Standards Track [Page 2]RFC 3912 WHOIS Protocol Specification September 2004
The absence of such security mechanisms means this protocol would not
normally be acceptable to the IETF at the time of this writing.
6. Acknowledgements
Ran Atkinson created an earlier version of this document. Ken
Harrenstien, Mary Stahl, and Elizabeth Feinler were the authors of
the original Draft Standard for WHOIS.
7. References
7.1. Normative References
[1] Harrenstien, K., Stahl, M., and E. Feinler, "NICNAME/WHOIS", RFC
954, October 1985.
Author's Address
Leslie Daigle
VeriSign, Inc.
21355 Ridgetop Circle
Dulles, VA 20166
US
EMail: leslie@verisignlabs.com; leslie@thinkingcat.com
Daigle Standards Track [Page 3]RFC 3912 WHOIS Protocol Specification September 2004
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