ICANN Acronyms and Terms
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WHOIS
A system which provides online records containing identifying and contact information about registered domain names, Autonomous System Numbers, and Internet Protocol addresses. The registration data is managed by registries and registrars. For years, the WHOIS system has been based on a simple plain text-based protocol (called the WHOIS protocol), described in the RFC 3912. The Registration Data Access Protocol (RDAP) began replacing the WHOIS protocol in 2015.