38
Buying a domain - WHOIS/PTR privacy? (programming.dev)
submitted 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) by anything_but_windows@programming.dev to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world
7 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hi!

I have noticed that on my domain when i run whois <domain> it returns a lot of information such as registrar name, abuse contact, creation date... even though i paid extra for "whois privacy." Then i found that for other domains whois returns a paltry amount of information such as "Malformed request." or just repeats the domain name and has "status: UNASSIGNABLE". specifically, one .fail domain and one .it domain. HOWEVER, those minimal whois records for the .it and .fail domains still have valid PTR entries that i can lookup publicly online.

HERE IS THE QUESTION: i want to buy a domain for the sole purpose of having a single A record that points to a corresponding PTR record on the VPS provider. however, i prefer to have the whois record be as minimal as the 2 examples i gave above. how are those whois entries so sparse?

I am doing all this with the goal of hosting a tor exit node. any help is greatly appreciated! have a lovely day!

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] mschae@discuss.mschae23.de 9 points 5 months ago

The information returned by whois depends on the registry. For example, most registries for European TLDs basically just show whether the domain is registered (I say “most” because I'm not sure whether it's actually all or if there are exceptions, but I know .de is like this). In that case, there aren't even “whois privacy” services available from registrars. For TLDs from other countries or gTLDs, this might vary.

In either case, do note what the other comment says. Whois is not the only way to identify who runs a service.

it returns a lot of information such as registrar name, abuse contact, creation date... even though i paid extra for "whois privacy."

If you didn't pay for whois privacy, it would most likely return your actual name, email address, phone number, and home address instead. “Whois privacy” just means your registrar inserts their information into these fields instead, and forwards any mail they might get to you.

[-] hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 2 points 5 months ago

Latest changes in the EU are part of the NIS-2 directive. My private German domains don't show a lot of detail and it's been like that for many years.

this post was submitted on 24 Mar 2026
38 points (97.5% liked)

Selfhosted

61790 readers
651 users here now

A place to share alternatives to popular online services that can be self-hosted without giving up privacy or locking you into a service you don't control.

Rules:

Detailed Rules Post

  1. Be civil.

  2. No spam.

  3. Posts are to be related to self-hosting.

  4. Don't duplicate the full text of your blog or readme if you're providing a link.

  5. Submission headline should match the article title.

  6. No trolling.

  7. Promotion posts require active participation, with an account that is at least 30 days old. F/LOSS without a paywall has exceptions, with requirements. See the rules link for details. Tags [CBH] or [AIP] are required, see the links in Rule 8 for details.

  8. AI-related discussions and AI-involved promotional posts have additional requirements for tagging, as noted in Rule 7 and the AI & Promotional Post Expanded Rules post, and find example disclosures here.

Resources:

Any issues on the community? Report it using the report flag.

Questions? DM the mods!

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
ruud@lemmy.world
Loki@lemmy.world
CannaVet@lemmy.world
devve@lemmy.world
ayyy@sh.itjust.works
curbstickle@anarchist.nexus
curbstickle_lw@lemmy.world