List of Internet whois servers, 8 March 2000

ftp://sipb.mit.edu/pub/whois/whois-servers.list

List of Internet whois servers, 8 March 2000 (Version 4.19)

This list was collected and compiled by Matt Power of M.I.T.

Questions or comments about this list should be sent to the address:

    [email protected]


Preferred server name              Associated institution
---------------------------------------------------------------------
whois.alabanza.com                 Alabanza, Inc C=US
whois.compuserve.com               CompuServe Interactive Services, Inc C=US
whois.discount-domain.com          interQ Inc. C=JP
dns411.com                         Name.Space C=US
whois.domaindiscover.com           TierraNet, Inc. C=US
whois.domainpeople.com             NetNation Communications Inc. C=CA
whois.easyspace.com                EasySpace Ltd. C=GB
whois.enom.com                     eNom, Inc. C=US
whois.geektools.com                CenterGate Research Group, LLC C=US
whois.ibm.com                      IBM C=US
whois.internetnamesww.com          Melbourne IT C=AU
whois.names4ever.com               A+Net Registrar C=US
whois.namesecure.com               Maaznet Directory Service Inc. C=US
whois.networksolutions.com         Network Solutions, Inc. C=US
whois.pacbell.com                  Pacific Bell C=US
whois.register.com                 Forman Interactive Corp C=US
whois.registrars.com               Internet Domain Registrars C=US
whois.sunquest.com                 Sunquest Information Systems C=US

whois.berkeley.edu                 University of California at Berkeley C=US
www.binghamton.edu                 State University of New York at Binghamton C=US
finger.caltech.edu                 California Institute of Technology C=US
csufresno.edu                      California State University - Fresno C=US
csuhayward.edu                     California State University - Hayward C=US
csus.edu                           California State University - Sacramento C=US
whois.cwru.edu                     Case Western Reserve University C=US
cc.fsu.edu                         Florida State University C=US
directory.gatech.edu               Georgia Institute of Technology C=US
gettysburg.edu                     Gettysburg College C=US
gmu.edu                            George Mason University C=US
whois.dfci.harvard.edu             Dana-Farber Cancer Institute C=US
hmc.edu                            Harvey Mudd College C=US
indiana.edu                        Indiana University C=US
nii.isi.edu                        US Domain Registry C=US
whois.isi.edu                      .INT Whois Service C=US
whois.messiah.edu                  Messiah College C=US
whois.rsmas.miami.edu              University of Miami, Rosentiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences C=US
mit.edu                            Massachusetts Institute of Technology C=US
directory.msstate.edu              Mississippi State University C=US
vax2.winona.msus.edu               Minnesota State University - Winona C=US
info.nau.edu                       Northern Arizona University C=US
whois.ncsu.edu                     North Carolina State University C=US
nd.edu                             University of Notre Dame C=US
earth.njit.edu                     New Jersey Institute of Technology C=US
vm1.nodak.edu                      North Dakota State University C=US
austin.onu.edu                     Ohio Northern University C=US
ph.orst.edu                        Oregon State University C=US
osu.edu                            Ohio State University C=US
whois.oxy.edu                      Occidental College C=US
info.psu.edu                       Pennsylvania State University C=US
whois.cc.rochester.edu             University of Rochester C=US
whitepages.rutgers.edu             Rutgers University C=US
whois.sdsu.edu                     San Diego State University C=US
stanford.edu                       Stanford University C=US
camis.stanford.edu                 Stanford University C=US
stjohns.edu                        St. John's University C=US
sunysb.edu                         State University of New York, Stony Brook C=US
whois.bcm.tmc.edu                  Baylor College of Medicine C=US
whois.ubalt.edu                    University of Baltimore C=US
directory.ucdavis.edu              University of California at Davis C=US
uchicago.edu                       University of Chicago C=US
ucsd.edu                           University of California at San Diego C=US
weber.ucsd.edu                     University of California at San Diego, Division of Social Sciences C=US
cgl.ucsf.edu                       University of California at San Francisco, School of Pharmacy C=US
whois.uh.edu                       University of Houston C=US
whois.umass.edu                    University of Massachusetts at Amherst C=US
lookup.umd.edu                     University of Maryland C=US
umn.edu                            University of Minnesota C=US
ns.unl.edu                         University of Nebraska at Lincoln C=US
whois.upenn.edu                    University of Pennsylvania C=US
x500.utexas.edu                    University of Texas at Austin C=US
netlib2.cs.utk.edu                 na-net (linear algebra on computers) C=US
whois.virginia.edu                 University of Virginia C=US
whois.wfu.edu                      Wake Forest University C=US
wisc.edu                           University of Wisconsin C=US
wpi.wpi.edu                        Worcester Polytechnic Institute C=US
ibc.wustl.edu                      Washington University C=US

vm1.hqadmin.doe.gov                U.S. Department of Energy Headquarters C=US
wp.doe.gov                         U.S. Department of Energy C=US
llnl.gov                           Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory C=US
x500.arc.nasa.gov                  NASA Ames Research Center C=US
x500.gsfc.nasa.gov                 NASA Goddard Space Flight Center C=US
whois.hq.nasa.gov                  NASA Headquarters C=US
x500.ivv.nasa.gov                  NASA Software Independent Verification & Validation Facility C=US
whois.jpl.nasa.gov                 NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory C=US
x500.jsc.nasa.gov                  NASA Johnson Space Center C=US
larc.nasa.gov                      NASA Langley Research Center C=US
whois.larc.nasa.gov                NASA Langley Research Center C=US
x500.msfc.nasa.gov                 NASA Marshall Space Flight Center C=US
x500.ssc.nasa.gov                  NASA Stennis Space Center C=US
x500.wstf.nasa.gov                 NASA White Sands Test Facility C=US
x500.nasa.gov                      National Aeronautics and Space Administration C=US
wp.nersc.gov                       National Energy Research Supercomputer Center C=US
whois.nic.gov                      Center for Email Technology C=US
seda.sandia.gov                    Sandia National Laboratories C=US

whois.nic.mil                      DoD Network Information Center C=US
whois.nrl.navy.mil                 Naval Research Laboratory C=US

whois.6bone.net                    6bone Registry C=US
whois.abuse.net                    Network Abuse Clearinghouse C=US
whois.aco.net                      Austrian Academic Computer Network C=AT
whois.apnic.net                    Asia Pacific Network Information Center C=SC
whois.arin.net                     American Registry for Internet Numbers C=US
whois.aunic.net                    The .AU Registry C=AU
whois.awregistry.net               All West Communications C=US
whois.cary.net                     CARYNET & HK eDNS Whois server C=HK
whois.corenic.net                  CORE Internet Council of Registrars C=CH
whois.crsnic.net                   Network Solutions, Inc. for Shared Registration System C=US
whois.cw.net                       Cable & Wireless USA C=US
wp.es.net                          Energy Sciences Network C=US
whois.hinet.net                    Chunghwa Telecom C=TW
ds.internic.net                    Network Solutions, Inc. (non-MILNET/non-POC) C=US
whois.internic.net                 Network Solutions, Inc. C=US
whois.ja.net                       JANET C=GB
whois.krnic.net                    Korea Network Information Center C=KR
whois.lac.net                      Latin America & Caribbean Whois Server C=EC
companies.mci.net                  RFC 2345 TLD-WHOIS demonstration server C=US
whois.nameit.net                   nameIT C=US
whois.netnames.net                 NetNames (.AF, .BT, .PW, .TM) C=GB
whois.nomination.net               NomiNation (.GB.COM, .GB.NET, .UK.COM, .UK.NET) C=GB
whois.nsiregistry.net              Network Solutions, Inc. C=US
whois.oleane.net                   OLEANE SA C=FR
whois.opensrs.net                  Open Shared Registration System C=US
pcdc.net                           Pacific Communications Development Corp. C=TW
whois.ra.net                       The Routing Arbiter Project C=US
whois.ripe.net                     Reseaux IP Europeens C=NL
whois.ripn.net                     Russian Institute for Public Networks C=RU
whois.thnic.net                    Thailand Network Information Center C=TH
whois.twnic.net                    Taiwan Network Information Center C=TW

whois.dhs.org                      Domain Host Services C=AU
whois.morris.org                   Morris Automated Information Network C=US

whois.nic.ac                       nic.ac C=AC
whois.nic.am                       AM Network Information Centre C=AM
whois.nic.as                       ASNIC C=AS
wp.tuwien.ac.at                    Technische Universitat Wien C=AT
whois.risc.uni-linz.ac.at          Research Institute for Symbolic Computation, University of Linz C=AT
whois.wu-wien.ac.at                Wirtschaftsuniversitaet Wien C=AT
archie.au                          Australian Academic and Research Network C=AU
whois.connect.com.au               Connect.com.au Pty Ltd C=AU
whois.adelaide.edu.au              University of Adelaide C=AU
whois.monash.edu.au                Monash University C=AU
uwa.edu.au                         University of Western Australia C=AU
sserve.cc.adfa.oz.au               University College, Australian Defense Force Academy C=AU
whois.kuleuven.ac.be               Katholieke Universiteit Leuven C=BE
whois.belnet.be                    Belgian National Research Network C=BE
whois.registro.br                  registro.br C=BR
whois.camosun.bc.ca                Camosun College, Victoria, B.C. C=CA
whois.canet.ca                     Bell Canada Internet Transit Service C=CA
whois.cdnnet.ca                    CDNnet C=CA
whois.queensu.ca                   Queen's University, Kingston, Canada C=CA
ac.nsac.ns.ca                      Nova Scotia Agricultural College C=CA
whois.unb.ca                       University of New Brunswick C=CA
panda1.uottawa.ca                  University of Ottawa C=CA
dvinci.usask.ca                    University of Saskatchewan, Engineering C=CA
whois.usask.ca                     University of Saskatchewan C=CA
phys.uvic.ca                       University of Victoria, Physics & Astronomy C=CA
whois.uwo.ca                       University of Western Ontario C=CA
whois.nic.cc                       NIC.CC Registration Services C=CC
whois.nic.ch                       SWITCH Swiss Academic and Research Network C=CH
whois.nic.ck                       Cook Islands Network Information Centre C=CK
whois.nic.cl                       U. de Chile (NIC Chile) C=CL
whois.cnnic.net.cn                 Computer Network Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences C=CN
whois.ci.ucr.ac.cr                 University of Costa Rica Computer Center C=CR
whois.cuni.cz                      Charles University, Prague C=CZ
whois.mff.cuni.cz                  Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics C=CZ
www.fce.vutbr.cz                   Faculty of Civil Engineering, Technical University of Brno C=CZ
gopher.fme.vutbr.cz                Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Technical University of Brno C=CZ
whois.fee.vutbr.cz                 Faculty of Elec. Eng. and Computer Sci., Technical Univ. of Brno C=CZ
whois.vutbr.cz                     Technical University of Brno C=CZ
whois.fh-koeln.de                  Fachhochschule Koeln C=DE
whois.fzi.de                       Forschungszentrum Informatik C=DE
hermes.informatik.htw-zittau.de    HTW Zittau/Goerlitz Elektrotechnik/Informatik C=DE
whois.nic.de                       DEutsches Network Information Center C=DE
whois.th-darmstadt.de              Darmstadt University of Technology C=DE
whois.tu-chemnitz.de               Technische Universitaet Chemnitz C=DE
whois.uni-regensburg.de            Universitaet Regensburg C=DE
whois.uni-c.dk                     Danish Computing Centre for Research and Education C=DK
whois.ut.ee                        University of Tartu C=EE
whois.eunet.es                     EUnet, Goya, Spain C=ES
whois.dit.upm.es                   Tech. Univ. Madrid, Telecommunications Highschool C=ES
cs.hut.fi                          Helsinki University of Technology C=FI
oulu.fi                            Oulu University C=FI
vtt.fi                             Technical Research Centre of Finland C=FI
whois.nic.fr                       Association Francaise pour le Nommage Internet en Cooperation C=FR
whois.nordnet.fr                   NordNet C=FR
whois.univ-lille1.fr               University of Sciences and Technologies of Lille - France C=FR
whois.hknic.net.hk                 HKNIC C=HK
whois.registry.hm                  HM Domain Registry C=HM
whois.iisc.ernet.in                Indian Institute of Science C=IN
whois.ncst.ernet.in                National Centre for Software Technology C=IN
isgate.is                          Association of Research Networks in Iceland C=IS
isgate3.isnet.is                   Internet a Islandi C=IS
pgebrehiwot.iat.cnr.it             Nigerian TLD Registration Service C=NG
dsa.nis.garr.it                    GARR-NIS c/o CNR-CNUCE C=IT
whois.nic.it                       Italian Network Information Center C=IT
whois.nic.mx                       Network Information Center - Mexico C=MX
whois.aist-nara.ac.jp              Nara Institute of Science and Technology C=JP
whois-server.l.chiba-u.ac.jp       Chiba University C=JP
whois.hiroshima-u.ac.jp            Hiroshima University C=JP
gopher.educ.cc.keio.ac.jp          Science and Technology Computing Center, Keio University C=JP
whois.cc.keio.ac.jp                Keio University C=JP
whois.cc.uec.ac.jp                 University of Electro-Communications C=JP
whois.yamanashi.ac.jp              Yamanashi University C=JP
whois.nic.ad.jp                    Japan Network Information Center C=JP
www.orions.ad.jp                   Osaka Regional Information and Open Network Systems C=JP
whois.domain.kg                    Kyrgyzstan TLD C=KZ
sorak.kaist.ac.kr                  Korea Advanced Institute of Science & Technology C=KR
whois.nic.or.kr                    Korea Network Information Center C=KR
whois.domain.kz                    Kazahstan Domain Name Registry C=KZ
whois.nic.li                       SWITCH Swiss Academic and Research Network C=LI
whois.nic.lk                       Sri Lanka Domain Registry C=LK
www.restena.lu                     RESTENA C=LU
whois.nic.mm                       MM-NIC C=MM
www.nic.mx                         NIC-Mexico C=MX
condor.dgsca.unam.mx               Univ. Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, D.G. de Servicios de Computo Academico C=MX
domain-registry.nl                 Stichting Internet Domeinregistratie Nederland C=NL
whois.norid.no                     UNINETT FAS (NORID) C=NO
whois.nic.nu                       .NU Domain Ltd C=NU
whois.canterbury.ac.nz             University of Canterbury C=NZ
directory.vuw.ac.nz                Victoria University, Wellington C=NZ
waikato.ac.nz                      Waikato University C=NZ
whois.patho.gen.nz                 PATHOGEN C=NZ
whois.domainz.net.nz               Domainz -- The New Zealand Internet Registry Ltd C=NZ
whois.rcp.net.pe                   Red Cientifica Peruana C=PE
whois.icm.edu.pl                   Interdyscyplinarne Centrum Modelowania Matematycznego i Komputero C=PL
whois.elka.pw.edu.pl               Faculty of Electronic Engineering, Warsaw University of Technology C=PL
whois.ia.pw.edu.pl                 Institute of Automatic Control, Warsaw University of Technology C=PL
whois.dns.pt                       Fundacao para a Computacao Cientifica Nacional C=PT
dsa.fccn.pt                        Fundacao para a Computacao Cientifica Nacional C=PT
chalmers.se                        Chalmers University of Technology C=SE
kth.se                             Royal Institute of Technology C=SE
whois.nic-se.se                    Network Information Centre Sweden C=SE
sics.se                            Swedish Institute of Computer Science C=SE
whois.nic.net.sg                   Singapore Network Information Centre C=SG
whois.nic.sh                       NIC.SH Domain Registry C=SH
whois.uakom.sk                     SANET (WAN of Slovak academic institutions) C=SK
whois.nic.st                       Domain Council of Sao Tome and Principe C=ST
whois.adamsnames.tc                AdamsNames (.GS, .MS, .TC, .TF, .VG) C=TC
whois.nic.tj                       TJ-NIC C=TJ
whois.tonic.to                     Tonic Domain Name Registry C=TO
whois.metu.edu.tr                  Middle East Technical University C=TR
whois.seed.net.tw                  Seednet C=TW
whois.iii.org.tw                   Institution for Information Industry C=TW
src.doc.ic.ac.uk                   Imperial College C=GB
whois.lut.ac.uk                    Loughborough University C=GB
whois.nic.uk                       Nominet UK (.UK Domain Registrar) C=GB
dsa.shu.ac.uk                      Sheffield Hallam University C=GB
whois.state.ct.us                  Department of Administrative Services, State of Connecticut C=US
info.cnri.reston.va.us             Corporation for National Research Initiatives, Knowbot interface C=US
whois.frd.ac.za                    National Research Foundation C=ZA
whois.und.ac.za                    University of Natal (Durban) C=ZA
whois.co.za                        Foundation for Research Development C=ZA

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Documentation", and other comments...


Redistribution
--------------
If you redistribute this list, or excerpt a significant number of
entries from it, be sure to also pass along the original anonymous-FTP
location, and request that updates be sent to my e-mail address, as
specified at the top of this file. This will allow users to obtain
updated versions at a later time, and will help ensure that I get the
information I need to do the updating.

Also, keep in mind that accessing a whois server requires a direct
connection to the Internet. In general, sites that have access to the
Internet via tcp/whois will also have access to the Internet via
tcp/ftp, and will thus be able to obtain this file directly. Making
the file available via a mail-based server is therefore largely
unnecessary.


Updates
-------
I am interested in any corrections to the above listing, and in
reports of other whois servers. Please send them via e-mail to the
address listed at the top of this file. Unless the maintainer of the
server has already announced his whois service publicly, I will
attempt to contact the postmaster or system maintainer prior to
including a new entry.


Scope
-----
Whois servers, at least by my definition, provide directory
information in response to TCP queries on port 43, in a manner roughly
analogous to the DDN NIC whois service described in RFC 954. I realize
that many sites instead provide this directory service via the finger
protocol, or accept queries by mail for directory information.
Although I'd be happy to receive reports of these, the scope of this
particular listing is limited to the TCP whois service.

There are a few hosts that accept tcp/whois connections, but respond
with information identical to that given by a standard finger server.
Since I don't consider this a directory service, I have been omitting
these hosts.


Unlisted servers
----------------
I know of some other whois servers that aren't listed above (at their
maintainers' requests), even though they allow access to at least a
small amount of directory information. Currently, this includes
twenty-two in North America, six in Europe, and one in Asia. Typical
reasons include: service is about to be shut down, service is still
being developed and will be announced later, or another server
provides the same data in a better supported manner.


Server names
------------ 
There are currently three popular naming conventions for whois
servers. The most common practice is to put whois service on a host
as far up as possible in the organization's domain hierarchy. For
example, the highest-level domain name associated with M.I.T. is
MIT.EDU, and M.I.T.'s whois service is operated on the host named
mit.edu.

Another common practice is to choose 'whois' or 'wp' as the first part
of the domain name ('wp' stands for "White Pages"). This would be the
case if M.I.T.'s whois service were on a host named whois.mit.edu or
wp.mit.edu. In these cases, the listed name is often an alias, not the
host's canonical name. In selecting the name to be listed, I've given
preference to aliases starting with whois or wp.

I personally prefer the first-mentioned convention, since it results
in shorter command lines, and ones I believe are less confusing to
beginning Internet users. In particular, the top-level host often
supports organization-wide mail service, and thus the same host name
can be used for whois queries and for e-mail.


Usage
-----
The most common access approach involves separately querying each
server of interest, via a direct tcp/whois connection. However, there
are currently a number of active projects concerned with improved
interfaces to these servers, either by more intelligent client
software, or by standardization of the server behavior. Eventually,
this should eliminate the need for end users to have the complete
collection of server names; at this point, though, distributing the
server list to individual Internet users is still worthwhile.

The procedure for accessing the whois servers will vary depending on
your host's operating system, and on what software is installed. On
UNIX systems, the preferred method is

    whois -h _server_name_ _name_of_person_

If there is no whois program, sometimes it will work to type

    telnet _server_name_ 43

and then type the "name of person" on a separate line. (The usefulness
of this will vary depending on the details of the telnet client
implementation installed on your system.)

Alternatively, you may be able to compile a whois program yourself,
starting from source code available at various anonymous FTP sites. As
a start, you might try searching archie for files named 'whois.tar.Z'.

Programs named 'whois' and 'telnet' may also be available on VMS
systems. Typing 'HELP WHOIS' or 'HELP TELNET' at the DCL prompt may be
useful.

Whois programs may also be installed on other operating systems, or
may be available for these systems via anonymous FTP. Searching archie
for file names matching 'whois' (case insensitive) might be worthwhile.

Also, system administrators interested in starting new whois servers
will probably be able to find one or more separate source-code
packages on anonymous FTP sites. In addition to checking archie, you
may wish to look in the file whois-servers.source, available at the
anonymous-FTP location listed at the top of this file.


Other Formats of This List
--------------------------
Whenever this whois-servers.list file is updated, it is automatically
converted to a few other formats. One that might be of common interest
is a "Summary" version that contains just the server names and
locations, one per line, and a few comment lines that each begin with
';'. This version can be obtained via

    whois -h sipb.mit.edu whois-servers

or from a few replication sites that can be found by doing

    whois -h sipb.mit.edu whois-list-servers

It's intended mainly for people who have a program to copy the server
list occasionally (e.g., once a week) for local redistribution. If
you're able to redistribute via whois (i.e., by supporting the query
whois -h _your_server_name_ whois-servers), please let me know and
I'll add you to the list of replication sites.


Gopher Access
-------------
The data in this list are also available via the Internet Gopher
system. Gopher clients should connect to the host sipb.mit.edu, port
70, and choose the selection "Internet whois servers". The
whois-server entries accessible in the sipb.mit.edu Gopher server are
automatically updated whenever this file is changed.

Alternatively, one can access this same Gopher menu by connecting to a
root Gopher server at the University of Minnesota and selecting
"Phone Books" then "WHOIS Searches".


AFS Access
----------
Sites using Transarc's AFS (Andrew File System) software can access
the whois-servers.list file using the AFS global name space pathname

    /afs/sipb.mit.edu/project/gopher-links/whois-servers.list

(i.e., it is in the directory project/gopher-links relative to
root.cell for the sipb.mit.edu cell.)


Access Restrictions
-------------------
In general, these servers should only be used for isolated queries
about specific individuals of interest. Typically, it is not
acceptable to make an extended series of queries in an attempt to
obtain large sections, or the entirety, of the directory. Such a
strategy is objectionable both because of excessive consumption of
server resources, and because the directory itself is usually
considered proprietary. In particular, deriving lists of persons for
distribution of commercial advertisements or solicitations is
expressly prohibited by site policies in many cases, and could easily
cause sites to curtail the current open access to their whois servers.


Server problems
---------------
Not all of the whois-server entries constitute a "supported" service
within their respective domains.  Even at sites where the service is
supported, there may be occasional changes in the server host name.
Also, at any given time, you will probably find one or more of the
servers not operational, or apparently unusable. I have not
purposefully included any servers that I believe have been permanently
shut down. In all cases, either I have personally seen the server
provide useful information within the last few months, or else the
maintainers of the server have asked me to include it anyway, while
they work on resolving usage problems.


Collection
----------
The list was collected primarily via an active resource-discovery
approach involving polling selected Internet hosts for possible
support of tcp/whois service. This was done with some attention to
minimizing consumption of resources on other Internet hosts and
networks. In particular, no DNS zone transfers were used to generate
lists of polling candidates. Instead, a small number of host names in
most second-level domains were selected, using various heuristics, and
whois queries were attempted to each of these. All queries originated
from hosts in the MIT.EDU domain. Also, I've been maintaining versions
of this list since August 1990, and since then a number of persons
have mailed me reports of new whois servers, or updates on the servers
already listed here.