European Data in the InterNIC Database
- Date: Mon, 29 Apr 1996 12:07:29 +0200
Dear Mark,
as you know the RIPE community has a long standing concern about the
consistency of the information available from the InterNIC whois service
and the RIPE NCC whois service. The information describing European
entities in the RIPE database is consistently found to be more
up-to-date than data registered at the InterNIC. Both the InterNIC and
the RIPE NCC have been trying to get the exchange of information to work
for more than three years with little success due to lack of resources
on both sides.
At the same time we observe an increasing number of instances where data
about European entities obtained to the InterNIC whois service is
causing confusion and delays in Internet trouble shooting. Some of this
is due to new and relatively unexperienced NOC staff in many places.
Today it becomes extremely important that people are referred to the
correct information.
The RIPE local-IR working group has discussed this problem at its recent
meeting in Berlin. Since making our databases consistent has not worked
despite our long standing intentions, the RIPE community now asks you to
remove data describing European entities from the InterNIC database as
soon as possible. The InterNIC whois server should not return data and
contact info about these.
Most importantly this concerns address space information of
192.162.0.0 - 192.162.255.255
192.164.0.0 - 192.168.255.255
193.0.0.0 - 195.255.255.255
and AS number information of
1877 - 1901
2043
2047
2107 - 2136
2585 - 2614
2773 - 2822
2830 - 2879
3154 - 3353
5377 - 5631
If possible the InterNIC whois server should return a text pointing to
whois.ripe.net if these objects are queried. It should never return
more specific data. Could you please inform us when this will be
implemented.
We hope that you understand the importance of this to the smooth
operation of the Internet as a whole. This request is not intended as a
critique on the InterNIC's services or staff. It is just a logical
consequence of the existence of multiple regional Internet registries
and the difficulties in creating a globally synchronised database.
I hope that after all we will succeed in achieveing such a global
database, but until then we have to take measures to prevent confusion.
Thank you in advance for your help with this issue.
Daniel
