Dear Colleagues, We've gone over the changes discussed and agreed on for improving the ability to find abuse information in the RIPE database, and have come up with the following modifications. Please have a look. We will be making announcements once final agreement is done, and adding a URL to the banner and dbupdate messages. Two things did not make it into this proposal from our side. One is that we find the name "IRT" somewhat confusing, but we have no specific proposal to change it. The second is a proposal to change the order of objects in query results, which will be sent as a separate proposal, since it is not very related and might cause controversy. -- Shane Kerr Software Manager RIPE NCC Following discussions in the Database Working Group at RIPE 49, we have prepared a proposal to make changes to the whois server software. The changes we propose are: o To hide attributes that contain e-mail addresses in the default output of queries. We will also provide an option to disable this feature, o To add a new "abuse-mailbox:" attribute to PERSON, ROLE, IRT, MNTNER, ORGANISATION, INETNUM, and INET6NUM objects, o To provide an option to display only key attributes and abuse contacts, o To change the IRT object template so that the "signature:" and "encryption:" attributes are no longer mandatory, o To change the behaviour of the '-c' switch in whois queries. We will announce the changes on our website. We will also contact any third-party software developers who rely on the RIPE Database for abuse contact information. You can read the minutes from the Database Working Group discussion at: http://www.ripe.net/ripe/maillists/archives/db-wg/2004/msg00469.html (1) Adding the "abuse-mailbox:" Attribute We will add a new attribute to the following object types: INETNUM INET6NUM PERSON ROLE IRT ORGANISATION MNTNER This optional attribute will contain at least one e-mail address. It will tell users where to send abuse complaints or queries. (The proposed templates for the above objects are at the end of this document.) The description of the new attribute will be the same in all objects: abuse-mailbox: Specifies the e-mail address to which abuse complaints should be sent. An e-mail address as defined in RFC 2822. There is currently a "trouble:" attribute in ROLE objects, which contains free text. We will update ROLE objects, so that any ROLE object that has a "trouble:" attribute that is an e-mail address as defined in RFC 2822, will be copied to the "abuse-mailbox:" attribute. Any other "trouble:" attributes will be converted to "remarks:". As an example, see the following: role: Example Role address: Example Address phone: +11 22 33445 fax-no: +11 22 33445 e-mail: info@localhost admin-c: TEST1-RIPE tech-c: TEST1-RIPE trouble: Please contact trouble: abuse@localhost trouble: for abuse reports, not info@localhost nic-hdl: TESTROLE1-RIPE changed: info@localhost 20050101 source: RIPE We will replace this with: role: Example Role address: Example Address phone: +11 22 33445 fax-no: +11 22 33445 e-mail: info@localhost admin-c: TEST1-RIPE tech-c: TEST1-RIPE remarks: "trouble:" converted on 2005mmdd remarks: Please contact abuse-mailbox: abuse@localhost remarks: for abuse reports nic-hdl: TESTROLE1-RIPE changed: info@localhost 20050101 source: RIPE (2) Hiding Attributes That Contain E-Mail Addresses Finding the right e-mail address for abuse reports can be confusing. There is currently no easy way to find this information in the RIPE Database. Users often send mail to every e-mail address they see in a query result. To avoid this, we will hide all attributes that contain e-mail addresses from the default output of a whois query for an address. When a user looks up an address, the results may include the following objects: INETNUM INET6NUM ROUTE ROUTE6 ORGANISATION PERSON ROLE By default, MNTNER objects are not shown, but they are often also queried to get contact information. For each of the object types, the following attributes contain e-mail addresses: INETNUM: notify, changed INET6NUM: notify, changed ROUTE: notify, changed ROUTE6: notify, changed ORGANISATION: e-mail, notify, changed PERSON: e-mail, notify, changed ROLE: e-mail, trouble, notify, changed For each address range returned, if there is at least one "abuse-mailbox:" attribute in any of the returned objects, the attributes mentioned above will be removed from the output. If there is no "abuse-mailbox:" attribute, only "notify:" and "changed:" attributes will be filtered out. If an attribute of an object is changed, a comment will be added, to avoid confusion. Users can turn off this suppression. To make this possible, we will implement a '-B' flag. As an example: $ whois 10.0.0.10 Might currently give the following result: inetnum: 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255 netname: HOME-NETWORK descr: Home Network country: ZZ admin-c: ME1-RIPE tech-c: ME1-RIPE abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm@localhost status: ALLOCATED PI mnt-by: I-MNT changed: ripe-dbm@localhost 20050101 source: RIPE person: Me Myself and I address: Home Alone phone: +11 22 33445 fax-no: +11 22 33445 e-mail: ripe-dbm@localhost nic-hdl: ME1-RIPE mnt-by: I-MNT changed: ripe-dbm@localhost 20050101 source: RIPE After the change, the result will be: % Note: this output has been filtered. inetnum: 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255 netname: HOME-NETWORK descr: Home Network country: ZZ admin-c: ME1-RIPE tech-c: ME1-RIPE abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm@localhost status: ALLOCATED PI mnt-by: I-MNT source: RIPE person: Me Myself and I address: Home Alone phone: +11 22 33445 fax-no: +11 22 33445 nic-hdl: ME1-RIPE mnt-by: I-MNT source: RIPE To see the unmodified result, users should type in: $ whois -B 10.0.0.10 (3) Adding 'abuse output' Option To help authors of tools or users who are only interested in the abuse contacts for IP addresses, we will implement a brief output mode. If a user types '-b' when querying the RIPE Database, they will only see the key attributes of address ranges and the "abuse-mailbox:" attribute. This switch will also imply '-c', which requests first level less specific INETNUM or INET6NUM objects with the "mnt-irt:" attribute. It will only work with address space related queries. Here is an example: $ whois 10.0.0.0 Returns: inetnum: 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255 netname: HOME-NETWORK descr: Home Network country: ZZ admin-c: ME1-RIPE tech-c: ME1-RIPE abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm@localhost status: ALLOCATED PI mnt-by: I-MNT changed: ripe-dbm@localhost 20050101 source: RIPE person: Me Myself and I address: Home Alone phone: +11 22 33445 fax-no: +11 22 33445 e-mail: ripe-dbm@localhost nic-hdl: ME1-RIPE mnt-by: I-MNT changed: ripe-dbm@localhost 20050101 abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm-person@localhost source: RIPE So: $ whois -b 10.0.0.0 Will return: % Note: this output has been filtered. % Only primary keys and abuse contact will be visible. inetnum: 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255 abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm@localhost abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm-person@localhost This output will not generate valid objects, and there will be no object separators. If two ranges are returned after making a query, an object separator will be inserted between groupings. Therefore, the output will look like this: inetnum: 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255 abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm@localhost abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm-person@localhost (*) inetnum: 10.0.1.0 - 10.0.0.255 abuse-mailbox: ripe-dbm-person-2@localhost (*) Attributes marked by (*) are taken from the person object retrieved by a recursive lookup. (4) Modifications on the IRT Object We will change the template for the IRT object will be changed. You will no longer need a KEY-CERT object to create an IRT object. Currently, the template for the IRT object is: irt: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] address: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] phone: [optional] [multiple] [ ] fax-no: [optional] [multiple] [ ] e-mail: [mandatory] [multiple] [lookup key] signature: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] encryption: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] org: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] admin-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] auth: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] irt-nfy: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] "signature:" and "encryption:" attributes need existing key-cert objects. The Anti-spam Working Group asked us to make these objects optional. You can read an archive of this discussion at: http://www.ripe.net/ripe/maillists/archives/db-wg/2004/msg00452.html The template for irt objects will be: irt: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] address: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] phone: [optional] [multiple] [ ] fax-no: [optional] [multiple] [ ] e-mail: [mandatory] [multiple] [lookup key] signature: [optional] [multiple] [ ] encryption: [optional] [multiple] [ ] org: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] admin-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] auth: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] irt-nfy: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] Therefore, the object below would be valid: irt: irt-someorg-zz address: address for the irt phone: +11 22 3344556 fax-no: +11 22 3344556 e-mail: contact@localhost admin-c: CONTACT1-RIPE tech-c: CONTACT1-RIPE auth: CRYPT-PW XXXXXXXXXXXXX mnt-by: mnt-someorg changed: someone@localhost 20050505 source: RIPE We will automate this process, so that help from the RIPE Database Management will no longer be necessary create IRT objects. (5) Changing the behaviour of '-c' option in whois queries Currently, the -c option requests first level less specific INETNUM or INET6NUM objects with the "mnt-irt:" attribute. It does not return any related IRT objects. This will change, so that -c will treat IRT objects as contacts and do recursive lookups on related IRT objects. Here is an example: $ whois -c 10.0.0.0 Returns: inetnum: 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255 netname: TEST-NET descr: Test Net country: ZZ admin-c: TEST1-RIPE tech-c: TEST1-RIPE status: ASSIGNED PA mnt-by: TEST-MNT mnt-irt: IRT-TEST changed: info@localhost 20050101 source: RIPE person: TEST1-RIPE . . After the change, the result will be: inetnum: 10.0.0.0 - 10.0.0.255 netname: TEST-NET descr: Test Net country: ZZ admin-c: TEST1-RIPE tech-c: TEST1-RIPE status: ASSIGNED PA mnt-by: TEST-MNT mnt-irt: IRT-TEST changed: info@localhost 20050101 source: RIPE person: TEST1-RIPE . . irt: IRT-TEST . . (6) Modified Templates inetnum: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] netname: [mandatory] [single] [lookup key] descr: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] country: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] org: [optional] [single] [inverse key] admin-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] abuse-mailbox: [optional] [multiple] [ ] ** rev-srv: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] status: [mandatory] [single] [ ] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-lower: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-domains: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-routes: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-irt: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] inet6num: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] netname: [mandatory] [single] [lookup key] descr: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] country: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] org: [optional] [single] [inverse key] admin-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] abuse-mailbox: [optional] [multiple] [ ] ** rev-srv: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] status: [mandatory] [single] [ ] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-lower: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-routes: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-domains: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-irt: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] person: [mandatory] [single] [lookup key] address: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] phone: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] fax-no: [optional] [multiple] [ ] e-mail: [optional] [multiple] [lookup key] abuse-mailbox: [optional] [multiple] [ ] ** org: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] nic-hdl: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] role: [mandatory] [single] [lookup key] address: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] phone: [optional] [multiple] [ ] fax-no: [optional] [multiple] [ ] e-mail: [mandatory] [multiple] [lookup key] trouble: [optional] [multiple] [ ] abuse-mailbox: [optional] [multiple] [ ] ** org: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] admin-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] nic-hdl: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] irt: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] address: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] phone: [optional] [multiple] [ ] fax-no: [optional] [multiple] [ ] e-mail: [mandatory] [multiple] [lookup key] abuse-mailbox: [optional] [multiple] [ ] ** signature: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] encryption: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] org: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] admin-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] auth: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] irt-nfy: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] organisation: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] org-name: [mandatory] [single] [lookup key] org-type: [mandatory] [single] [ ] descr: [optional] [multiple] [ ] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] address: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] phone: [optional] [multiple] [ ] fax-no: [optional] [multiple] [ ] e-mail: [mandatory] [multiple] [lookup key] abuse-mailbox: [optional] [multiple] [ ] ** org: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] admin-c: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] ref-nfy: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-ref: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] mntner: [mandatory] [single] [primary/look-up key] descr: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] org: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] admin-c: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] tech-c: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] abuse-mailbox: [optional] [multiple] [ ] ** upd-to: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-nfy: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] auth: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] remarks: [optional] [multiple] [ ] notify: [optional] [multiple] [inverse key] mnt-by: [mandatory] [multiple] [inverse key] referral-by: [mandatory] [single] [inverse key] changed: [mandatory] [multiple] [ ] source: [mandatory] [single] [ ] Rows that are marked with '**' are additions to the templates.