Announcing Free WHOIS Privacy & Auto Renewal
Juan Ku
on
The team at DNSimple is excited to announce that WHOIS Privacy is now available for free across all plans, because privacy is a fundamental right that should be accessible to everyone.
We also heard your feedback and tackled our top requested feature at the same time: WHOIS privacy renewal.
Why isn't there an option to auto-renew WHOIS privacy?
Is there a reason why there is no auto-renewal (possibly regulatory)? Can this be automated via the API?
Just wondering why can't Whois Privacy be auto-renewed? Auto-renewal is turned on for the domain itself.
You'll never need to manually renew or pay for your WHOIS privacy at DNSimple again. Just like domain renewal, once enabled, it will remain active unless you choose to disable it. Enjoy free, uninterrupted protection for your personal information without the hassle of remembering to renew or dealing with confusing expiration emails.
Let's go over what WHOIS is, what this means for your privacy, and how to enable WHOIS privacy with auto renewal in DNSimple.
What is WHOIS?
The WHOIS service is a free, public directory that allows users to search for domain ownership and controller information, and each TLD maintains its own registration data. Depending on the TLD, a WHOIS lookup can tell you things like the owner's full name, address, phone number, email, and name server information. It's considered the source of truth for who owns and controls a domain.
Having public WHOIS domain information can be a problem. If you're registering a domain as an individual, your personal address, phone number, and email are public. You could end up flooded by spam, calls, and even junk mail after buying a new domain. But you can't use fake information. Doing can not only cause serious problems if you ever need to verify ownership, it's also illegal. This is where WHOIS Privacy Protection comes in.
WHOIS Privacy Protection replaces your information with proxy information, and only provides your real information to authorized entities on request. It shields your personal information from spammers, identity thieves, and cyberstalkers, while encouraging freedom of expression and protecting your privacy.
By offering this for free, we're taking a step towards a safer, more secure online environment for our customers and democratization of personal privacy. From now on, all domains that support WHOIS privacy and have been migrated to our new provider have access to free WHOIS privacy and automatic WHOIS privacy renewal.
Enabling WHOIS privacy
To enable WHOIS privacy protection for your domains, simply visit your domain page and follow the instructions provided. We've simplified the process so you'll never be asked to purchase or renew WHOIS privacy.
While WHOIS information is automatically redacted for generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs) like .com, .net, and .org thanks to GDPR, not all TLDs support WHOIS Privacy. Many have it written into their rules that proxies absolutely may not be used, so if you want to enable WHOIS privacy, make sure the domain you choose supports it.
Secure, private domains
DNSimple makes it easy to activate, deactivate, and renew your WHOIS privacy – no matter how many domains you might have. As long as the domain is registered with us, and the TLD supports the WHOIS Privacy service, we've got you covered.
We prioritized releasing these features thanks to your feedback. Hearing from you helps us better understand what you need in your DNS management, and we love talking about what you want to see next. Drop us a line and let us know what features you want from DNSimple.
Not using DNSimple yet? Give us a try free for 30 days. Still have questions? Get in touch. We're always here to help.
Juan Ku
Backend engineer at the kernel.
We think domain management should be easy.
That's why we continue building DNSimple.
