Home Forums Networks & Cross-Platform Networking Looking to see if url is available: Best place?

The danger of using godaddy and others is they seem to alert the wolves of the url you might be looking for. And those wolves may buy it up before you decide.
Is there a neutral website that you can trust 100% not to do that? thanks!

I suppose you're referring to 'domain name' rather than URL? I seriously doubt that outfits like GoDaddy are in the business of scooping domain names from their customers, or allow their employees to engage in such activities.

That said, and despite legislation passed in various countries, there is en entire 'industry' engaged in registering domain names with the express purpose of selling the odd one(s) desired by clients with deep pockets. Bottom line: there is no certainty that your favorite domain name hasn't been registered already, or that anything you can do will prevent it.

GoDaddy doesn't do that. Instead, what happens is that when GoDaddy queries ICANN to see whether a domain name is registered, the predators watch the ICANN queries. Since any register must query ICANN to check a domain name's availability, changing registrars doesn't help.

how do they watch the queries?

Tacit, thanks! great hearing from you.

Ok, I have had this suspicion for a long time since years ago, I searched on godaddy for a not very ingenious domain name (which they said was available) and two days later it was unavailable.

This is very infuriating, the idea that people see what I searched and then buy it.

Yesterday, I searched for a domaine name which was already taken.
This morning I get an email asking if I want to buy this domain from the 3rd party owner! How did that happen?

That actually did not bother me nearly as much as the idea that a name which is completely available may be bought, while I'm debating about buying it.

But you are saying there is not much I can do? There is no place to search where my inquiry is private.

I used to first just type the url in and see it there was a page, but that gets tiring as many times there is no page, but it's already bought.

To belabor the obvious, the answer is to make your decision before you search and be prepared to buy on the spot.

Your "search now, buy later" technique, which is simply the result of indecision, is costing you, perhaps heavily.

Artie,
I search because then I know they are available. I then query a few friends and colleagues for their opinions.

I need to know they are available. I don't want people telling me that's a great one! and then it's not available. the query / ansewrs could take a week.
So there is no site where my query is private. All eyes are looking all the time?

That's both backwards and bizarre, kevs!

You "don't want people telling [you] it's a great one, and then it's not available," but you, all by your lonesome, make the great ones unavailable by searching for them!

There's absolutely no reason why you can't poll your people and then make up a 1, 2, 3 list depending on availability when you finally search.

One thing you can do instead of doing a search at a registrar is do a whois.

Open your Terminal (it is in the Utilities folder inside the Applications folder). Then type

whois somedomain.com

and hit Return. If the domain is registered, even if no site is being hosted at that domain, you'll get the registration information. If the domain is not registered, you'll see

Whois Server Version 2.0

Domain names in the .com and .net domains can now be registered
with many different competing registrars. Go to http://www.internic.net
for detailed information.

No match for "somedomain.com".

and then a bunch of information about the whois database (you may have to scroll back in the Terminal window to see it).

I'm not sure how cybersquatters see domain name queries from registrars, but I know it's been a problem for years.

The Terminal-averse can accomplish the exact same thing through the Whois tab in Network Utility (also in Applications/Utilities).

That tab is very cool and easy to use. Thanks for the reminder.

In what way do the NICs differ from the registrars that prevents the cybersquatters from "watching" them?

Tacit, others, cool.
I just use this for who is:
http://whois.domaintools.com

Question: if I do the who is here, are the scavengers seeing what I'm searching for as they seem to be with Godaddy?

(of course it would seem they wont monitor that as a who is could be done for so many other reasons that a url check -- so my hunch would be that it the total solution)

Why even risk going through a 3rd party when you can do it yourself without having to use Terminal?

dkmarsh's solution seems tailor-made for you (as does mine).

You *always* have to go through a third party in order to get information about a domain name. Your Mac doesn't contain a record of this information; it can't, and there'd be no reason for it to.

The whois servers basically do a domain lookup with whatever Internet registry is responsible for that particular top level domain. Registrars also use this same information, but a query from a registrar is useful to domain cybersquatters whereas a query from an end user isn't (end users usually use whois to try to find who owns a domain, whereas people use registrar Web sites in order to see if a domain they want is available).

that's it Tacit, I think you solved that, thanks!

So cybersquatters watch what the registrars search for, and, if I'm understanding, the NICs and registrars both search the same sources, but a query from a registrar is "significant," whereas a query from an NIC isn't?

That roundaboutedly answers my earlier question, i.e. "In what way do the NICs differ from the registrars that prevents the cybersquatters from "watching" them?"

Thanks

but how to squatters know what you're searching for?

I know there have been a few incidents in the past where if you went to a registrar's main page and used their web interface to do an "availability check", there were a few cases where the registrar would "temporarily register" it if you didn't buy it immediately. iirc the few that started doing that backed off quickly following backlash, saying they were just "registering them just in case you wanted them to make sure they were available for you" or some such nonsense.

So unless someone's sniffing packets (or has a foot in the door at a registrar's computer), the only one that should know what you're looking up is whoever is running the web page you're doing the lookup from.

The "whois" tab on the network pref probably does a DIG to get the basic root domain information, including root authority, and then queries the root authority directly for registration information. So that should only communicate with your ISP's domain name server and the actual root authority for the domain you're requesting? Someone correct me if I'm wrong here.

The amount of domain squatting has significantly dropped since that totally stupid idea of Domain Tasting was put to an end.



That's a 250-fold decrease