NAME
whois —
Internet domain name and
network number directory service
SYNOPSIS
whois |
[-6AadfgilmQRr]
[-c country-code
| -h host]
[-p port]
name
[...] |
DESCRIPTION
The
whois utility looks up records in the databases maintained
by several Network Information Centers (NICs).
The options are as follows:
-
-
- -6
- Use the IPv6 Resource Center (6bone) database. It contains
network names and addresses for the IPv6 network.
-
-
- -A
- Use the Asia/Pacific Network Information Center (APNIC)
database. It contains network numbers used in East Asia, Australia, New
Zealand, and the Pacific islands.
-
-
- -a
- Use the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)
database. It contains network numbers used in those parts of the world not
covered by AfriNIC, APNIC, LACNIC or by RIPE.
(Hint: All point of contact handles in the ARIN whois database end with
“
-ARIN
”.)
-
-
- -c
country-code
- This is the equivalent of using the -h
option with an argument of
“country-code
.whois-servers.net
”.
-
-
- -d
- Use the US Department of Defense database. It contains
points of contact for subdomains of .MIL.
-
-
- -f
- Use the African Network Information Center (AfriNIC)
database. It contains network numbers used in Africa.
-
-
- -g
- Use the US non-military federal government database, which
contains points of contact for subdomains of .GOV.
-
-
- -h
host
- Use the specified host instead of the default NIC
(whois.crsnic.net). Either a host name or an IP address may be specified.
By default whois constructs the name of a whois server to
use from the top-level domain (TLD) of the supplied (single) argument, and
appending “
.whois-servers.net
”. This
effectively allows a suitable whois server to be selected automatically
for a large number of TLDs.
In the event that an IP address is specified, the whois server will default
to the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN). If a query to ARIN
references AfriNIC, APNIC, LACNIC, or RIPE, that server will be queried
also, provided that the -Q option is not specified.
If the query is not a domain name or IP address, whois
will fall back to whois.crsnic.net.
-
-
- -i
- Use the Network Solutions Registry for Internet Numbers
(whois.networksolutions.com) database. Historically, it contained network
numbers and domain contact information for most of .COM, .NET, .ORG and
.EDU domains. However, the registration of these domains is now done by a
number of independent and competing registrars and this database holds no
information on the domains registered by organizations other than Network
Solutions, Inc. Also, note that the InterNIC database
(whois.internic.net) is no longer handled by Network
Solutions, Inc. For details, see
http://www.internic.net/.
(Hint: Contact information, identified by the term handle,
can be looked up by prefixing “
!
” or
“handle
” to the NIC handle in
the query.)
-
-
- -l
- Use the Latin American and Caribbean IP address Regional
Registry (LACNIC) database. It contains network numbers used in much of
Latin America and the Caribbean.
-
-
- -m
- Use the Route Arbiter Database (RADB) database. It contains
route policy specifications for a large number of operators'
networks.
-
-
- -p
port
- Connect to the whois server on port.
If this option is not specified, whois defaults to the
“whois” port listed in /etc/services (port
43).
-
-
- -Q
- Do a quick lookup. This means that whois
will not attempt to lookup the name in the authoritative whois server (if
one is listed) nor will it contact InterNic if a lookup fails. This flag
has no effect when combined with any other flag.
-
-
- -R
- Use the Russia Network Information Center (RIPN) database.
It contains network numbers and domain contact information for subdomains
of .RU. This option is deprecated; use the -c option
with an argument of “
RU
” instead.
-
-
- -r
- Use the R´eseaux IP Europ´eens (RIPE) database.
It contains network numbers and domain contact information for
Europe.
The default action, unless directed otherwise with a special
name, is to do a very broad search, looking for matches
to
name in all types of records and most fields (name,
nicknames, hostname, net address, etc.) in the database. For more information
as to what
name operands have special meaning, and how
to guide the search, use the special name “help”.
Special cases
Queries beginning with an exclamation point
‘
!
’ are assumed to be NSI contact handles.
Unless a host or domain is specified on the command line,
(whois.networksolutions.com) will be used as the
whois
database.
Similarly, queries beginning with “COCO-” are assumed to be CORE
contact handles. Unless a host or domain is specified on the command line,
(whois.corenic.net) will be used as the
whois database.
EXAMPLES
Most types of data, such as domain names and IP addresses, can be used as
arguments to
whois without any options, and
whois will choose the correct whois server to query. Some
exceptions, where
whois will not be able to handle data
correctly, are detailed below.
To obtain contact information about an administrator located in the Russian TLD
domain “
RU
”, use the
-c
option as shown in the following example, where
CONTACT-ID is substituted with the actual contact
identifier.
whois -c RU CONTACT-ID
(Note: This example is specific to the TLD
“
RU
”, but other TLDs can be queried by
using a similar syntax.)
The following example demonstrates how to obtain information about an IPv6
address or hostname using the
-6 option, which directs the
query to 6bone.
whois -6 IPv6-IP-Address
The following example demonstrates how to query a whois server using a
non-standard port, where “
query-data
” is
the query to be sent to
“
whois.example.com
” on port
“
rwhois
” (written numerically as 4321).
whois -h whois.example.com -p rwhois
query-data
SEE ALSO
Ken Harrenstien and
Vic White, NICNAME/WHOIS,
1 March 1982, RFC
812.
HISTORY
The
whois command appeared in
4.3BSD.