Domain related crime is certainly a cause for serious concern for any Chief Security Officer. Not only these attacks are challenging to repel, but they can bring down the entire company if you fail to address them adequately. Using WHOIS records to analyze domains is an approach that can effectively prevent these threats.
WHOIS gives you useful information about a web entity that seeks to engage with your own company’s online assets. You can get the domain’s registration data, details about websites’ owners, as well as analyze domain ownership history, and much more. It allows you to take preemptive action against suspicious online entities even before they reveal themselves to be threats.
As G.I. Joe points out at the end of each show, “Knowing is half the battle.” And so to help you win your war against cybercrime, here are five good WHOIS resources that give you valuable information and practical advice about how you can leverage WHOIS data.
WhoisXML API
WhoisXML API is a WHOIS data provider that develops a suite of tools for actionable cyber threat intelligence. Of the five resources featured here, their blog takes the most thorough and technical approach and directly addresses IT and cybersecurity practitioners.
Their blog section appears to be regularly updated with a couple of feature articles posted each month. You will find a lot of use cases and articles explaining how your business can benefit from WHOIS data. There are also many how-to’s, tips, and tricks, as well as articles that explore some of their products. If you are a seasoned IT worker, or someone not averse to technology, this blog will prove to be an excellent resource.
IQWhois
Compared to the previous example, the IQWhois blog is more friendly to WHOIS and domain analysis newbies. They describe themselves as a reverse WHOIS domain name ownership database and offer an archive of billions of domain name records.
Where IQWhois’s blog excels is in the way it has been organized to cater to novices in the field of WHOIS, domain analysis, and cybersecurity. They explain fundamental concepts clearly and with as little jargon as possible. The perspective is always from that of business, and so the content here is intended for business decision-makers rather than IT and cybersecurity practitioners.
Domain Name Stat
As the company name states, and as concurred in their About page, they offer “domain name stats made insanely available.” Their blog posts discuss both domain concepts and WHOIS cybersecurity concepts, and these are presented so that they can be easily understood by non-techie people.
Currently, there are only a dozen or so articles here, but you can still discover a virtual loot bag of domain analysis and security information. Explanation of basic concepts, use cases, and how-tos make up its blog inventory.
Whoisology
Whoisology’s blog is undoubtedly the most beginner-friendly among all on this list. They are a domain ownership archive, and their posts share the latest developments in the industry. At the moment there isn’t much here in terms of quantity, less than a dozen posts, but these are well-written and explain the subject matter clearly.
Here you can learn more about the current domain landscape, the latest controversial topics, as well as get practical tips about various applications of WHOIS data, and how to use their proprietary solution.
JsonWHOIS
JsonWHOIS is a company that provides a WHOIS database download service, as well as Screenshot and Social APIs. Their blog does not yet contain many articles comparing to other companies listed here. However, the material they have covers very interesting topics that explain various WHOIS use cases quite well. The language and tone are targeted toward tech-savvy workers and executives who would like to better understand WHOIS and how it might impact their businesses.
These are excellent resources for you to get started with WHOIS and domain analysis. The coverage among these five blogs is sufficient to help you understand the basic concepts or dive deeper into the subject and learn why domain data is important to securing your Web assets.
