ICANN - Respect My Privacy

[Matt Thorne <thorne.matt@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear ICANN –

Regarding the proposed rules governing companies that provide WHOIS privacy
services (as set forth in the Privacy and Policy Services Accreditation
Issues Policy document):

I urge you to respect my rights to privacy and due process.
- I deserve the right to privacy.
- My personal information should not be revealed without a court order,
regardless of whether the request comes from a private individual or law
enforcement agency.

Private information should be kept private.

I run a small, private intranet site for my family and a few pages are
accessible via the public internet via a domain name. Please don't publish
my personal information simply because I own a domain name.

If private registrations are taken away it will just increase the amount of
bogus WHOIS data... God help us when Joe Smith and Jane Doe are the owners
of 50% of the world's websites.

This proposed change also discourages me from setting up a new website for
a support group for a specific mental health issue. It would be a place for
users to come anonymously and be able to talk about their deepest
struggles... I don't even share my specific mental health issue with MY
FAMILY and wouldn't want anyone WHOIS'ing the fact that I set up a support
group site for a mental health issue I don't want anyone to know about!

These are just my specific concerns in relation to my microscopic footprint
on the WWW... imagine what harm this can bring when any criminal can WHOIS
any domain owners personal details... identity theft, harassment, social
engineering, assassinations... the list goes on and on.

Please don't put these changes in place.

Thank you.