Cross-Community Session: Accreditation and Access to Non-Public WHOIS Data Post-GDPR

Under the Temporary Specification passed by the ICANN Board implementing the interim GDPR compliance model, there is a placeholder for an accreditation system to facilitate uniform access to non-public WHOIS data by appropriate users for legitimate purposes. Under the current iteration of the Temporary Specification, contracted parties must provide access to non-public registration data for the legitimate purposes specified in Section 4 of the Temporary Specification, unless the request for access is outweighed by the domain name registrant’s fundamental right to privacy. Article 29 Working Party issued a statement encouraging ICANN to develop an access model for and this statement was endorsed by the European Data Protection Board (EDPB). Currently, there is no uniform system for approving legitimate users to obtain access to non-public registration data in connection with such legitimate purposes, and streamlining the process so it is less burdensome for contracted parties who otherwise must perform ad hoc individual review of each request for data. It is urgent that ICANN and the community come together to push forward a workable credentialed access system for non-public WHOIS data for legitimate purposes with a fundamental role in preserving the security and stability of the Internet’s unique identifier systems. In this cross-community session, panelists will engage with the community to discuss work to date on developing a credentialed access system for non-public registration data, and seek to generate ideas for next steps for integrating such a system into a future iteration of the Temporary Specification or as part of the expedited policy development process to devise a Consensus Policy for registration data directory service (RDDS). - Session Leader: Cyrus Namazi Staff Facilitator: Maria Otanes