1 .TH WHOIS 1 "Oct 2, 2009"
   2 .SH NAME
   3 \fBwhois\fP
   4 \- Internet domain name and network number directory service
   5 .SH SYNOPSIS
   6 \fBwhois\fP
   7 [\fB\-aAbfgiIklmQr\fP]
   8 [\fB\-c\fP \fIcountry-code\fP | \fIFl\fP h \fIhost\fP]
   9 [\fB\-p\fP \fIport\fP]
  10 \fIname\fP...
  11 .SH DESCRIPTION
  12 The
  13 \fBwhois\fP
  14 utility looks up records in the databases maintained by several
  15 Network Information Centers (NICs).
  16 
  17 The options are as follows:
  18 .TP
  19 \fB\-a\fP
  20 Use the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN) database.
  21 It contains network numbers used in those parts of the world covered neither by
  22 APNIC, AfriNIC, LACNIC, nor by RIPE.
  23 
  24 (Hint: All point of contact handles in the ARIN whois database end with -ARIN.)
  25 
  26 .TP
  27 \fB\-A\fP
  28 Use the Asia/Pacific Network Information Center (APNIC) database.
  29 It contains network numbers used in East Asia, Australia,
  30 New Zealand, and the Pacific islands.
  31 .TP
  32 \fB\-b\fP
  33 Use the Network Abuse Clearinghouse database.
  34 It contains addresses to which network abuse should be reported,
  35 indexed by domain name.
  36 .TP
  37 \fB\-c\fP \fIcountry-code\fP
  38 This is the equivalent of using the
  39 \fB\-h\fP
  40 option with an argument of \fIcountry-code\fP.whois-servers.net.
  41 .TP
  42 \fB\-f\fP
  43 Use the African Network Information Centre (AfriNIC) database.
  44 It contains network numbers used in Africa and the islands of the
  45 western Indian Ocean.
  46 .TP
  47 \fB\-g\fP
  48 Use the US non-military federal government database, which contains points of
  49 contact for subdomains of
  50 \fI\&.GOV\fP.
  51 .TP
  52 \fB\-h\fP \fIhost\fP
  53 Use the specified host instead of the default variant.
  54 Either a host name or an IP address may be specified.
  55 
  56 By default
  57 \fBwhois\fP
  58 constructs the name of a whois server to use from the top-level domain (TLD)
  59 of the supplied (single) argument, and appending .whois-servers.net .
  60 This effectively allows a suitable whois server to be selected
  61 automatically for a large number of TLDs.
  62 
  63 In the event that an IP
  64 address is specified, the whois server will default to the American
  65 Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN).
  66 If a query to ARIN references APNIC, AfriNIC, LACNIC, or RIPE,
  67 that server will be queried also, provided that the
  68 \fB\-Q\fP
  69 option is not specified.
  70 
  71 If the query is not a domain name or IP address,
  72 \fBwhois\fP
  73 will fall back to
  74 \fIwhois.crsnic.net\fP.
  75 .TP
  76 \fB\-i\fP
  77 Use the Network Solutions Registry for Internet Numbers
  78 (\fIwhois.networksolutions.com\fP)
  79 database.
  80 It contains network numbers and domain contact information for most of
  81 \fI\&.COM\fP,.NET,.ORG
  82 and
  83 \fI\&.EDU\fP
  84 domains.
  85 
  86 .B NOTE !
  87 The registration of these domains is now done by a number of
  88 independent and competing registrars and this database holds no information
  89 on the domains registered by organizations other than Network Solutions, Inc.
  90 Also, note that the InterNIC database
  91 (\fIwhois.internic.net\fP)
  92 is no longer handled by Network Solutions, Inc.
  93 For details, see
  94 \fIhttp://www.internic.net/\fP.
  95 
  96 (Hint: Contact information, identified by the term
  97 .IR handle ,
  98 can be looked up by prefixing "handle" to the NIC
  99 handle in the query.)
 100 .TP
 101 \fB\-I\fP
 102 Use the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) database.
 103 It contains network information for top-level domains.
 104 .TP
 105 \fB\-k\fP
 106 Use the National Internet Development Agency of Korea's (KRNIC)
 107 database.
 108 It contains network numbers and domain contact information
 109 for Korea.
 110 .TP
 111 \fB\-l\fP
 112 Use the Latin American and Caribbean IP address Regional Registry
 113 (Tn LACNIC)
 114 database.
 115 It contains network numbers used in much of Latin America and the
 116 Caribbean.
 117 .TP
 118 \fB\-m\fP
 119 Use the Route Arbiter Database (RADB) database.
 120 It contains route policy specifications for a large
 121 number of operators' networks.
 122 .TP
 123 \fB\-p\fP \fIport\fP
 124 Connect to the whois server on
 125 \fIport\fP.
 126 If this option is not specified,
 127 \fBwhois\fP
 128 defaults to port 43.
 129 .TP
 130 \fB\-Q\fP
 131 Do a quick lookup.
 132 This means that
 133 \fBwhois\fP
 134 will not attempt to lookup the name in the authoritative whois
 135 server (if one is listed).
 136 This option has no effect when combined with any other options.
 137 .TP
 138 \fB\-r\fP
 139 Use the R\(aaeseaux IP Europ\(aaeens (RIPE) database.
 140 It contains network numbers and domain contact information
 141 for Europe.
 142 
 143 The operands specified to
 144 \fBwhois\fP
 145 are treated independently and may be used
 146 as queries on different whois servers.
 147 .SH EXIT STATUS
 148 The \fBwhois\fP utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.
 149 .SH EXAMPLES
 150 Most types of data, such as domain names and IP addresses, can be used as
 151 arguments to
 152 \fBwhois\fP
 153 without any options, and
 154 \fBwhois\fP
 155 will choose the correct whois server to query.
 156 Some exceptions, where
 157 \fBwhois\fP
 158 will not be able to handle data correctly, are detailed below.
 159 
 160 To obtain contact information about an
 161 administrator located in the Russian TLD domain RU,
 162 use the
 163 \fB\-c\fP
 164 option as shown in the following example, where
 165 \fICONTACT-ID\fP
 166 is substituted with the actual contact identifier.
 167 
 168 whois -c RU CONTACT-ID
 169 
 170 (Note: This example is specific to the TLD RU,
 171 but other TLDs can be queried by using a similar syntax.)
 172 
 173 The following example demonstrates how to query
 174 a whois server using a non-standard port, where
 175 ``query-data''
 176 is the query to be sent to
 177 ``whois.example.com''
 178 on port
 179 ``rwhois''
 180 (written numerically as 4321).
 181 
 182 whois -h whois.example.com -p rwhois query-data
 183 .SH SEE ALSO
 184 
 185 Vic White and Ken Harrenstien, \fINICNAME/WHOIS\fP, 1 March 1982, RFC 812.
 186 .SH HISTORY
 187 The
 188 \fBwhois\fP
 189 command appeared in
 190 4.3BSD.