[arin-ppml] SWIPs & IPv6

[Chris Engel]

Ted,

I supported what Milton posted because I happaned to aggree with the point he was making not because I was trying to score points with him. I'm sure there are any number of other issues that he and I will disagree on and he is more then welcome to come after me like a pit bull on them if he so desires.

The privacy restrictions that the DMV might operate under vary wildly from state to state....and yes I will conceede that there are MANY states that are woefully lacking in that regard. Perhaps I should have been more explicit on which states the analogy would be accurate under and which it wouldn't.

Anyway, what I see is 2 seperate and distinct needs here...

ARIN in it's role as a numbers registry (presumably) needs to know the ACTUAL entities who are using an IP address block and what it is being used for. It needs to do this (I presume) in order to independantly verify the justification for the request of an additional assignment.....and likely contact info of the ISP's NOC is not sufficient for that purpose given that it would be the ISP's request that was being verified.

You, as Joe Public, really don't need to know WHO holds a particular address block....you just need to know what that address block is and how to go about reporting problems caused by it. You don't really need to know who that entity is to accomplish that...just where to report the issue. The point where you would need to know the actual identity of the block holder is likely the point at which law enforcment or the courts should be getting involved anyway.

Note, I personaly think there is value in a public WHOIS directory and don't mind participating in it myself.... but it's not like I work for Salman Rushdie's publisher or anything like that. The many people who I annoy generaly aren't going to do anything more harsh then tell me I'm a moron. I CAN see organizations that do have legitimate privacy concerns about something like WHOIS.


Christopher Engel