WHOIS is a protocol that makes it simple to view the information a particular domain has been registered with either through a command line or by using special web-based lookup sites. This info includes the names, address and e-mail address of the owner, administrator, technical and billing persons as well as the registrar business the Internet domain has been obtained through, the creation and expiration dates. With the exception of a number of country-code TLDs that have certain limitations, the WHOIS info of any domain name can be changed freely anytime, which is quite necessary since according to the policies of the top-level Internet Corporation, ICANN, all details ought to be current and valid at all times. Inability to conform with these policies may lead to losing the ownership of a domain address and in many cases a domain name might even be removed from the Domain Name System and released for free registration.