WHOIS is the public lookup service that shows who a domain belongs to. In the past, it showed the owner’s name, address, email and phone number to anyone who asked, which made it a favourite source for spammers.
What’s shown today
- .uk and .co.uk: Nominet, which runs .uk, doesn’t publish personal details such as your name and address in its public WHOIS. You don’t need to do anything to get this protection.
- .com, .net and similar domains: since data protection law (GDPR) arrived in 2018, registrars generally hide individual registrants’ personal details from public WHOIS results, replacing them with “redacted for privacy”.
Organisation names can still be shown for domains registered to a business. That’s usually fine, and can even help show customers that a website is genuinely yours.
Check your own domain
Look your domain up on Nominet’s WHOIS (for .uk domains) or ICANN’s lookup tool at lookup.icann.org (for .com and others) and see exactly what the public can see.
Keep the private details accurate
Even though your details are hidden, they must be accurate. Registries can suspend domains registered with false details, and you’ll need a working email address to prove ownership if you ever transfer or recover the domain.