ICANN WHOIS Registrant Verification Policy Print

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All domain registrants should know of this ICANN policy.

Your domain services can be suspended by ICANN if you do not act accordingly.

ICANN has made changes to the Registrar Accreditation Agreement which affects all new registrations or changes made to the WHOIS contact information on your domain.  The policy took effect January 1st, 2014.

The WHOIS information for your domain is important to be correct and complete in case there is ever any dispute over the ownership of the domain name.  These changes ensure that valid contact information properly links the domain name to the owner of the domain. Incomplete, or incorrect domain name ownership information can negatively affect the website or email addresses being used with it.

ICANN New Domain Registration Changes

All domain registrations having a new registrant contact will trigger a confirmation email to be sent to the registrant’s email with a link that must be clicked to verify the new email address.

Verifying your email address is easy and can be done in a single click.  You have a period of 15 days to verify your new contact information before it will be applied to your domain.

ICANN mandates that FAILURE TO REPLY to the email WILL RESULT IN SUSPENSION of the domain name. All applicable domain services WILL DEACTIVATE.

You will see the below message displayed by web browsers, when users attempt to connect to your website. This message is not served by Namesonic.

icann suspension notice

If you have already verified your contact information and use the same registrant information again for other domains, you will not have to verify your address again.

Once the email address is verified, the registrar reinstate's the domain's previous routing settings. However the global updating system can still require 24-48 hrs for the domain to be fully restored ( web users to reach your website ).

NOTE : If you do not have access to the registrant email address , the domain WHOIS record must be updated, after which a new ICANN registrant verification email will be issued.
( See : How to update my domain WHOIS record )

ICANN Existing Domains

These changes also apply to domains that you already own.  The fields affected by this policy are the WHOIS Contact Registrant's first name, last name, and email address.

When updating this WHOIS contact information for your existing domain name, the new registrant contact will receive an email with a verification link that must be clicked in order to validate the address.

If this registrant has already responded to a verification email then you will not have to re-verify it again.

You have a period of 15 days to verify your new contact information before it will be applied to your domain.  ICANN mandates that failure to reply to the email can result in temporary suspension of your domain name.


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