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Learn · Lesson 12

WHOIS, RDAP and privacy: what the world can see about your domain

Every registered domain has a public record. How much it says about you depends on the ending, and for Australian names the answer is quite different from what most overseas guides describe.

Last reviewed:

The short version

  • WHOIS is the public lookup of who holds a domain and which registrar it’s with. RDAP is its modern replacement, showing the same things.
  • A .au lookup shows the registrant’s name and ABN or ACN, but never an address, a phone number or the expiry date.
  • A .com lookup shows the registrar and the dates, and usually hides the holder’s details.
  • WHOIS privacy hides your details where the ending allows it. It isn’t allowed for .au names.

A public record for every name

When a domain is registered, a few facts about it go on a public record that anyone can look up. That record is what people mean by “WHOIS” (say “who is”). It exists so that a name on the internet can be traced to someone accountable for it.

auDA lists what its .au WHOIS tool is for, and the list holds for every ending:

  • “Check the availability of a .au domain name”
  • “Identify the registrant of a .au domain name (the person or entity that holds the domain name licence)”
  • “Contact .au registrants about matters relating to their domain name”

It’s also the quickest way to answer practical questions about your own domain: which registrar it’s with, which nameservers it uses, and whether it’s locked.

WHOIS and RDAP

WHOIS is also the name of the decades-old system that serves those records. It’s being replaced by a newer one called RDAP. ICANN describes RDAP as “created as the replacement for the WHOIS protocol”, delivering “WHOIS-like registration data, but in standardized data access and query response formats”.

The changeover is well under way. For .com-style endings, ICANN says registries and registrars must provide RDAP, “but as of 28 January 2025 they are no longer required to provide WHOIS services”, with a few exceptions.

For you, almost nothing changes. Lookup tools use whichever system is available, the information is the same, and everybody still calls it WHOIS.

What a lookup shows

This is where endings differ, and where overseas advice goes wrong for Australian names.

What a public lookup shows for a .com.au name and for a .com name For a .com.au name a lookup shows the registrant name, ABN or ACN, eligibility type, registrar, nameservers and status. It does not show the street address, phone number or expiry date. For a .com name a lookup shows the registrar, the creation and expiry dates, the nameservers and the status codes. The holder's name, email address, street address and phone number are usually hidden. A .com.au name SHOWN Registrant name ABN or ACN Eligibility type Registrar Nameservers Status NOT SHOWN Street address Phone number Expiry date A .com name SHOWN Registrar Creation date Expiry date Nameservers Status codes USUALLY HIDDEN Holder’s name Email address Address and phone
Roughly opposite approaches. .au names say who, but not when. .com names say when, but usually not who.

.au names

What appears is set by auDA’s WHOIS Policy. The public record includes the registrant’s legal name, its ID (an ABN or ACN), the eligibility type, the registrant contact’s name, the registrar, the nameservers, the status and the date the record was last modified.

Two things are deliberately left out:

  • Where you are. “In order to comply with Australian Privacy Act 1988 (Cth), the street address, telephone and facsimile numbers of registrants will not be disclosed.”
  • When it expires. “auDA has determined that creation, renewal and expiry dates will not be disclosed on the WHOIS service.”

A contact email address has to be on the record, “for the purpose of contacting the registrant in relation to their domain name”, but it appears only on auDA’s own web lookup, which sits behind a CAPTCHA and rate limits. It doesn’t have to be your personal address. A shared address such as domains@ works well, as long as somebody reads it.

If you’re a sole trader, note what this means: registering a .com.au puts your name and ABN on a public record. Registering as an individual with no ABN? Read our guide to domains without an ABN.

.com and other endings

A lookup on a .com shows the registrar, the creation and expiry dates, the nameservers and the status codes. The holder’s name and contact details are usually hidden, either because the registrar withholds personal data or because a privacy service is switched on.

WHOIS privacy, and why .au doesn’t have it

WHOIS privacy, also sold as ID protection or private registration, swaps your contact details on the public record for those of a privacy service. Messages sent to the listed address are passed on to you. On endings that allow it, it’s a reasonable thing to switch on, particularly for a domain registered in your own name.

It isn’t available for .au names at any provider. The .au Licensing Rules say so in one line: “A Person must not use a Proxy Service or Privacy Service to apply for a Licence.” The trade-off auDA has chosen is to show who holds each name while keeping addresses and phone numbers off the record entirely.

Why the record should be right

It’s tempting to treat registration details as a formality. They’re closer to a title deed.

  • It’s the evidence the name is yours. In a dispute with a former web designer or business partner, the registrant on the record is where the argument starts.
  • Codes go to the address on file. The transfer code for a .au name is emailed to the registrant contact. If that address is dead, you’ll need to prove to your registrar that you’re the registrant and get it updated first: read our guide to getting your .com.au domain password.
  • Eligibility hangs off it. A .com.au is tied to the ABN or ACN on the record. If the business changes structure, the registration needs updating to match. Our guides to the ABN check at renewal and changing the registrant of a .com.au explain what to do.

How to look a domain up

  • Any name: the WHOIS tab of our toolbox tells you whether a name is registered and links to the official record.
  • .au names: auDA’s lookup at whois.auda.org.au “provides the full publicly available WHOIS record”.
  • .com and most others: ICANN’s lookup at lookup.icann.org.

When you read a record, four lines matter most. Registrar is the company to contact about the registration. Status tells you whether it’s locked or on hold. Name servers tells you where the live DNS is. Registrant, where shown, tells you who holds it.

If the registrar line names a company you’ve never heard of, you probably registered through a reseller. That’s normal.

At Chill Domains. For endings whose registry supports it, WHOIS privacy (ID protection) is included at no extra cost. It’s off until you switch it on in your dashboard. It isn’t offered for .au names, because auDA’s rules don’t allow it. We’re a reseller, so the registrar shown on your domain’s public record is our wholesale registrar partner.

Terms in this lesson

WHOIS
The public lookup that shows whether a domain is registered and through which registrar.
RDAP
The modern replacement for WHOIS.
WHOIS privacy
A service that keeps your contact details out of public WHOIS results.
Registrant
The person or organisation a domain is registered to.
Registrar
A company accredited to add and change names in a registry.
Status code
A label on a domain’s public record that says what state it’s in, such as ok, clientTransferProhibited (locked) or serverHold (switched off by the registry).
Eligibility
The rules about who may register a particular ending.
Reseller
A business that sells and supports domains through an accredited registrar, without being a registrar itself.

Every term, in full, is in the glossary.

Sources

All read on 2 October 2026.

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