[anti-abuse-wg] WHOIS (AS204224)

Hi Sascha

On 04/11/2015 19:42, Sascha Luck [ml] wrote:
> On Wed, Nov 04, 2015 at 06:17:10PM +0100, denis wrote:

>
>> My main point was the chain of trust for resource holders and
>> resource managers. Also being contactable does not mean personal
>> contact data must be displayed to the public. There are many
>> ways to be contactable. But few people are even willing to
>> discuss possibilities when it comes to changing the data model.
>
> Maybe because it has served us reasonably well over the years,
> it's a massive effort to completely change it and it's still a
> damn sight better than most other RIRs' databases.

OK lets cut to the main point as all other issues hang off this one. 
"Reasonably" and "massive effort" are the key phrases here. Yes it is a 
massive effort for a major change to the data model, but maybe once 
every 15 years is worth the effort. The last time the data model was 
significantly changed was the implementation of RPSL in 2001.

It has served very well over the years but it does have limitations now. 
This is a database. You put stuff in and get stuff out. When you need a 
full day course to learn the basics of putting stuff in, it shouts there 
is a problem.

You talk about privacy and this whole thread is about making lots of 
personal data public and how many over engineered processes can be put 
in place to the detriment of all the good folk to trip up a few of the 
bad folk.

This again shouts it is time for a step back and rethink the way contact 
data is used, by whom and for what reason and who can be trusted for what.

Personalised auth was just one of my many ideas for a rethink of the 
data model and the only one that made it to the mainstream agenda, 
albeit watered down.

You mentioned privacy and protection of personal data in the database. 
Lets add to that security of data. Why does anyone need to see your 
MNTNER object. Why does anyone need to know who maintains your data, who 
can create your customer data, who gets notified of changes, etc. 
Another of my ignored proposals was to completely separate the 
operational data from the data needed to maintain the operational data. 
In other words the MNTNER objects and related PERSON and ROLE objects 
and all details of notifications and references to "mnt-by:", 
"mnt-lower:", etc. All this maintenance data is your business and no one 
elses. If they are separated all the maintenance info can be private and 
only available to you from your user account.

Now to do this also depends on another of my ignored ideas to use 
inheritance in the database to massively reduce the amount of duplicated 
data and rely more on the organisation centric model (another ignored 
idea) with more fixed, inherited data contained in, or linked to, the 
ORGANISATION object. As with the "abuse-c:". Almost 4 million INETNUM 
objects with tens of thousands containing identical data except for 
prefix and description. That is just crazy. But the original design did 
not consider this amount of growth.

Seriously, with a review of the data model we can end up with:
-a lot less personal data in the database
-contact data more relevant to the purpose
-relevant contacts only visible to the groups of people who need it
-chain of trust in organisations who manage the data
-verification done closer to the data source
-more accurate and more trusted and better protected contact data

In terms of the way this discussion thread has gone this must be a win, 
win, win situation. All I am suggesting is this discussion hits the 
mainstream agenda for the RIPE Database and lets see what possibilities 
exist.

cheers
denis

>
> rgds,
> Sascha Luck