All,
< Can someone at OPenSRS please confirm/deny (delete as
< appropriate) that they
< have/have not (delete as appropriate) sold their customer whois
< database for
< commercial purposes - e.g. UCE/spamming?
The following terms from the ICANN Registrar Accreditation Agreement govern
the circumstances under which we must release our whois database to third
parties.
"a. Registrar shall make a complete electronic copy of the data available at
least one time per week for download by third parties who have entered into
a bulk access agreement with Registrar.
b. Registrar may charge an annual fee, not to exceed US$10,000, for such
bulk access to the data.
c. Registrar's access agreement shall require the third party to agree not
to use the data to allow, enable, or otherwise support the transmission of
mass unsolicited, commercial advertising or solicitations via e-mail (spam).
d. Registrar's access agreement may require the third party to agree not to
use the data to enable high-volume, automated, electronic processes that
apply to Registrar (or its systems).
e. Registrar's access agreement may require the third party to agree not to
sell or redistribute the data except insofar as it has been incorporated by
the third party into a value-added product or service that does not permit
the extraction of a substantial portion of the bulk data from the
value-added product or service for use by other parties.
f. Registrar may enable SLD holders who are individuals to elect not to have
Personal Data concerning their registrations available for bulk access for
marketing purposes based on Registrar's "Opt-Out" policy, and if Registrar
has such a policy Registrar shall require the third party to abide by the
terms of that Opt-Out policy; provided, however, that Registrar may not use
such data subject to opt-out for marketing purposes in its own value-added
product or service."
The following terms from the Tucows Bulk Whois Data Access Agreement govern
the terms of use by these third parties of this data...
"a) Subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement, Tucows hereby
grants to Company and Company accepts a limited, non-exclusive,
non-transferable right to access and use the Data described in Exhibit A
(the �Data�) for lawful purposes, either for internal purposes or commercial
purposes, but not for any unlawful purpose or to (i) allow, enable or
otherwise support the transmission of mass unsolicited, commercial
advertising or solicitations via email (spam); or (ii) enable high volume,
automated, electronic processes that apply to Tucows (or its systems) or any
other Internet domain name registrar or registry for the registration of
second-level domain name(s). Notwithstanding the foregoing, Company agrees
not to sell or redistribute the Data except insofar as the Data has been
incorporated by Company into a value-added product or service that does not
permit the extraction of a substantial portion of the bulk data from the
value-added product or service for use by any third party."
(If anyone wants a complete copy of this agreement for review, please let me
know and I'll send it out to you).
So...the short answer is no we have not licensed our whois database to a
third party to allow them to send out BUCE. We have however licensed the
data to third parties according to the terms of the above agreement...
Hope this helps...
-rwr
