Persons who own one or more domain names may want to protect their identification by hiding their personal information from the general public. Domain ID protection, which is also known as ID protect, private registration or WHOIS protection, is a service that some companies provide to domain owners for just this purpose.
Function
Domain ID or WHOIS protection prevents others from viewing a domain owner's private information such as name, address, phone number and email address. When someone tries to uncover the personal information of the website owner by performing a WHOIS search, she may see a notice that the owner has enabled domain protection or contact information for the domain registrar or protection service.
Significance
When a service hides a domain owner's contact information, it can protect him from online or offline abuse such as harassment. In addition, if a domain owner chooses to run his website under a pseudonym, domain ID protection can further protect his identity. Some website owners prefer to remain anonymous because the content they add to their site can pose a threat to their careers. There have been several cases where employers have terminated bloggers because of website content. Heather Armstrong, who owns the website, dooce.com, experienced this treatment when her employer found her blog and terminated her job in 2002.
Features
Multiple organizations provide this service, such as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (with GoDaddy) and the Whois Privacy Protection Service (with eNom). When a person performs a search for a domain owner's personal information when the owner has enabled private registration, the results will vary depending upon the company that protects the information. The protection services may act as a middle man, allowing visitors to send a message that the service then forwards to the domain owner. This allows communications to occur without giving away confidential information.
Enabling
Users can enable domain protection when purchasing a domain name through a registrar, which may or may not be the same company that provides the user with web hosting services. Users may also be able to add this protection to a domain by editing domain options after the initial purchase. Generally, users must pay a fee for yearly domain protection. This fee varies among companies. For example, GoDaddy provides WHOIS protection, also known as private domain registrations, for $8.99 (as of July 2010) while NTC Hosting provides this service for $12 per year plus applicable taxes.
Warning
Although domain ID protection applies to a variety of top-level domains, including .com, .net and .org, customers cannot apply private registration to all domains. According to the eNom website, the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration does not allow users to register private domain names using the .us top-level domain. This change became effective as of January 26, 2006.
Considerations
Since June 10, 2008, the Canadian Internet Registration Authority automatically applies private domain registration to Canadian citizens, permanent residents, legal representatives and aboriginal persons of Canada. Domain owners have the option to show their personal information; however, private registration is the default setting.