There are many reasons to find the owner of a website. You might have landed here because:
- You have a website of your own. You want to check out if the details regarding the ownership of your domain are correct. Any mistakes here could result in missing renewal dates, partnership offers and other such important prospective.
- You want to make a website. You see that your preferred domain name has already been taken. Now you can either find another domain name or try to buy it from the current owner. If you are sure you can make an offer the owner can’t resist, you can start by finding out his details.
- You have a domain and you want to check if your privacy settings are all working as planned.
- To know about the expiry dates of the current ownership.
WHOIS database
It is the database which contains all the domain names with their respective owners. A search can be done directly using whois.net or other search providers like godaddy.com or other such websites. Just do a Google search for “WHOIS database search”.
If you want to find the owner for making an offer
This is when things might get tricky. Even though there is the case of transparency, the owners can still choose to keep their information private with the help of domain name registering companies. These companies do it for a special fee. It will be hard to find the owner of domain names with this kind of private registration.
Here is an example on how you can use this tool to get the name and details of the owner:
Step 1: Visit the website whois.net.
Step 2: Type in the domain name you want to search. In this example we have used google.com. Click on “GO”.
Step 3: A captcha image will come in like this
This is to verify that you are not a robot. It is a standard security feature to prevent spammers. Fill in the correct code and then click on “GO” again. In this example, “117” is the code.
Step 4: It will look something like this:
Here you can find out general information. You will also find the obvious fact that the domain name is already taken. What a find!
Scroll down to and you will get the required information.
If all negotiations with the owner fail, take note of the expiry date. If the owner forgets to renew his license, you can buy it cheaply unless it is put up for auction.
Summury
- Domain name owner information cannot be fabricated by the owner. He can only choose to hide it using a company’s name in place of his.
- While WHOIS is a great tool to gain information, spammers can easily target sensitive information provided.
- Use domain name privacy services to hide such information.
