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Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 13.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 14.\" without specific prior written permission. 15.\" 16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 17.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 18.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 19.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 20.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 21.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 22.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 23.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 24.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 25.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 26.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 27.\" 28.\" From: @(#)whois.1 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93 29.\" $FreeBSD$ 30.\" 31.Dd October 2, 2009 32.Dt WHOIS 1 33.Os 34.Sh NAME 35.Nm whois 36.Nd "Internet domain name and network number directory service" 37.Sh SYNOPSIS 38.Nm 39.Op Fl aAbfgiIklmQrR 40.Op Fl c Ar country-code | Fl h Ar host 41.Op Fl p Ar port 42.Ar name ... 43.Sh DESCRIPTION 44The 45.Nm 46utility looks up records in the databases maintained by several 47Network Information Centers 48.Pq Tn NICs . 49.Pp 50The options are as follows: 51.Bl -tag -width indent 52.It Fl a 53Use the American Registry for Internet Numbers 54.Pq Tn ARIN 55database. 56It contains network numbers used in those parts of the world covered neither by 57.Tn APNIC , AfriNIC , LACNIC , 58nor by 59.Tn RIPE . 60.Pp 61(Hint: All point of contact handles in the 62.Tn ARIN 63whois database end with 64.Qq Li -ARIN . ) 65.It Fl A 66Use the Asia/Pacific Network Information Center 67.Pq Tn APNIC 68database. 69It contains network numbers used in East Asia, Australia, 70New Zealand, and the Pacific islands. 71.It Fl b 72Use the Network Abuse Clearinghouse database. 73It contains addresses to which network abuse should be reported, 74indexed by domain name. 75.It Fl c Ar country-code 76This is the equivalent of using the 77.Fl h 78option with an argument of 79.Qq Ar country-code Ns Li .whois-servers.net . 80.It Fl f 81Use the African Network Information Centre 82.Pq Tn AfriNIC 83database. 84It contains network numbers used in Africa and the islands of the 85western Indian Ocean. 86.It Fl g 87Use the US non-military federal government database, which contains points of 88contact for subdomains of 89.Pa .GOV . 90.It Fl h Ar host 91Use the specified host instead of the default variant. 92Either a host name or an IP address may be specified. 93.Pp 94By default 95.Nm 96constructs the name of a whois server to use from the top-level domain 97.Pq Tn TLD 98of the supplied (single) argument, and appending 99.Qq Li .whois-servers.net . 100This effectively allows a suitable whois server to be selected 101automatically for a large number of 102.Tn TLDs . 103.Pp 104In the event that an IP 105address is specified, the whois server will default to the American 106Registry for Internet Numbers 107.Pq Tn ARIN . 108If a query to 109.Tn ARIN 110references 111.Tn APNIC , AfriNIC , LACNIC , 112or 113.Tn RIPE , 114that server will be queried also, provided that the 115.Fl Q 116option is not specified. 117.Pp 118If the query is not a domain name or IP address, 119.Nm 120will fall back to 121.Pa whois.crsnic.net . 122.It Fl i 123Use the Network Solutions Registry for Internet Numbers 124.Pq Pa whois.networksolutions.com 125database. 126It contains network numbers and domain contact information for most of 127.Pa .COM , .NET , .ORG 128and 129.Pa .EDU 130domains. 131.Pp 132.Sy NOTE ! 133The registration of these domains is now done by a number of 134independent and competing registrars and this database holds no information 135on the domains registered by organizations other than Network Solutions, Inc. 136Also, note that the 137.Tn InterNIC 138database 139.Pq Pa whois.internic.net 140is no longer handled by Network Solutions, Inc. 141For details, see 142.Pa http://www.internic.net/ . 143.Pp 144(Hint: Contact information, identified by the term 145.Em handle , 146can be looked up by prefixing 147.Qq Li "handle " 148to the 149.Tn NIC 150handle in the query.) 151.It Fl I 152Use the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority 153.Pq Tn IANA 154database. 155It contains network information for top-level domains. 156.It Fl k 157Use the National Internet Development Agency of Korea's 158.Pq Tn KRNIC 159database. 160It contains network numbers and domain contact information 161for Korea. 162.It Fl l 163Use the Latin American and Caribbean IP address Regional Registry 164.Pq Tn LACNIC 165database. 166It contains network numbers used in much of Latin America and the 167Caribbean. 168.It Fl m 169Use the Route Arbiter Database 170.Pq Tn RADB 171database. 172It contains route policy specifications for a large 173number of operators' networks. 174.It Fl p Ar port 175Connect to the whois server on 176.Ar port . 177If this option is not specified, 178.Nm 179defaults to port 43. 180.It Fl Q 181Do a quick lookup. 182This means that 183.Nm 184will not attempt to lookup the name in the authoritative whois 185server (if one is listed). 186This option has no effect when combined with any other options. 187.It Fl r 188Use the R\(aaeseaux IP Europ\(aaeens 189.Pq Tn RIPE 190database. 191It contains network numbers and domain contact information 192for Europe. 193.It Fl R 194Use the Russia Network Information Center 195.Pq Tn RIPN 196database. 197It contains network numbers and domain contact information 198for subdomains of 199.Pa .RU . 200This option is deprecated; use the 201.Fl c 202option with an argument of 203.Qq Li RU 204instead. 205.El 206.Pp 207The operands specified to 208.Nm 209are treated independently and may be used 210as queries on different whois servers. 211.Sh EXIT STATUS 212.Ex -std 213.Sh EXAMPLES 214Most types of data, such as domain names and 215.Tn IP 216addresses, can be used as arguments to 217.Nm 218without any options, and 219.Nm 220will choose the correct whois server to query. 221Some exceptions, where 222.Nm 223will not be able to handle data correctly, are detailed below. 224.Pp 225To obtain contact information about an 226administrator located in the Russian 227.Tn TLD 228domain 229.Qq Li RU , 230use the 231.Fl c 232option as shown in the following example, where 233.Ar CONTACT-ID 234is substituted with the actual contact identifier. 235.Pp 236.Dl "whois -c RU CONTACT-ID" 237.Pp 238(Note: This example is specific to the 239.Tn TLD 240.Qq Li RU , 241but other 242.Tn TLDs 243can be queried by using a similar syntax.) 244.Pp 245The following example demonstrates how to query 246a whois server using a non-standard port, where 247.Dq Li query-data 248is the query to be sent to 249.Dq Li whois.example.com 250on port 251.Dq Li rwhois 252(written numerically as 4321). 253.Pp 254.Dl "whois -h whois.example.com -p rwhois query-data" 255.Sh SEE ALSO 256.Rs 257.%A Ken Harrenstien 258.%A Vic White 259.%T NICNAME/WHOIS 260.%D 1 March 1982 261.%O RFC 812 262.Re 263.Sh HISTORY 264The 265.Nm 266command appeared in 267.Bx 4.3 . 268