How To Find Out Who Owns A Domain Name In Just A Few Clicks
The first move to make the website of your dreams is to purchase a domain. Having that in mind, selecting and buying a domain will not be an easy task by any means. But what happens when after weeks of research, you come up with the perfect name for your website, and on your quest to make it your own, you are faced with a big stop sign: The domain not being available. Why does that happen? In this article, you can read about understanding the domain ownership history and who the domain owner is.
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Add Domain Id Protection
When you register a domain name with ICANN, you must provide your contact information including your name, phone number, physical address, and email address.
As soon as your domain name is registered, this contact information becomes available to the public unless you pay for domain privacy through your domain registrar. This domain privacy will shield your information from view, keeping your personal information safe from spammers or worse, identity thieves.
Once youâve got the domain name in hand, youâre ready to find hosting and build your website. Consider a free CMS, like HubSpot, to design your website, strategize for SEO, and create a blog.
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Consider A New Domain Name
Theres a decent chance that even if you take all of these steps, the person that owns that domain now either wont want to sell, or will only accept a higher price than you can pay.
In that case, youre far from the first person to have to come up with an alternative to the first name you set your heart on. Consider different domain name extensionsif the .com is taken, the .net or .co may still be available. And brainstorm new domain name ideas. You may just come up with something you like even more than your original idea.
If All Else Fails: Talk To Your Website Host
If you still dont know who is hosting your email for your domain name or if you cant do whats listed above, talk to your website host. They should know or be able to help you figure out where the email portion of your domain name is being sent to.
It might be them or it might be at another place but they should be able to tell you.
The email host for a domain name can be on a different server than your website server . Sometimes hosting companies have to move things around to make them work better, so this happens from time to time.
If youre not sure who your website host is or server is, there are a few ways to find out:
- Check your credit card or bank statements who are you paying?
- Check with your website design company they might know.
- Check with your IT support department they should know.
Be creative and do some digging. The answers are out there. Dont give up but just figure the problem out.
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What Is A Whois Ip Lookup
An IP is a unique address of a server on the internet. Similar to how a telephone number allows you to connect to a specific phone on the telecom network, similarly, an IP address allows your computer to connect to a specific server on the internet.
Domain names and IP numbers are the framework upon which the entire world wide web is built.
IP numbers are assigned to networking organisations with a record maintained by governing bodies for each IP number and the organisation to which it has been assigned. A whois IP lookup allows you track the above mentioned details for a domain.
Why Search For A Domain Owner
The most obvious reason to locate a domain owner is to try to purchase the domain, but that isnt the only one. If a site claims to be a legitimate one owned by a major corporation but appears suspicious, checking its ownership is a way to verify its authenticity. Likewise, if a website has no contact information on its homepage or a contact page, a visitor could track down its owners in order to contact them with questions about the sites products or servicesor to report a technical problem.
Another reason to check domain ownership information is to safeguard the security of your own site against incorrect or incomplete contact information. Looking up the domain ownership records on an existing site allows owners to ensure that their information is correct and that nothing has been changed without permission. Searches for domain ownership can be accomplished through public WHOIS databases, website searches, and even email, depending on the reasons for conducting the search.
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Why A Good Domain Name Is Important
A domain name is your unique identifier among billions of other websites on the web. Thats why having a memorable and easy-to-type name is essential for having an online presence.
Your domain name serves as an extension of your personal or business name. In that sense it:
- Improves recognition and awareness.
- Adds extra credibility to your venture.
- Eventually boosts visitors recall.
Also, choosing a good domain name is important for SEO. Several years ago exact match domains were all the rage, but today most people choose brandable domain names.
Memorable domain names get typed to Google more frequently. Algorithms keep track of that and assign more authority to your website. As the branded search volume grows, your domain name earns extra authority points, so that it gets easier to rank for related keywords.
With that being said, lets move on to the how-to part.
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Welcome to the Digital.com WHOIS research tool. This web hosting checker tool gives detailed ownership and hosting information about a website, including the hosts IP address, registration details, contact information and more.
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How Do You Find Out Where Email Is Hosted
Out of everything weve just covered, finding where email is hosted is easiest. If youre on a Mac or Linux machine, there are some great command-line tools like dig and host that can quickly reveal MX records. Here are two examples:
Open terminal and type in digaaronreimann.com mx +short, and it will return the MX records:
Or go to terminal, and then enter host -t mx aaronreimann.com:
If youre using Windows, or arent comfortable with command line, you can still turn to a few web tools to make these procedures more user friendly. One of the most popular is MX Toolbox. It will return MX records and give you its best guess at where the email is hosted. If the MX lookup returns something less obvious, just grab the domain name that the MX lookup does return, and then use the other tools you just learned about to drop in the domain.
Hosting Checker Tool How Can It Help You
The Internet is an open space where you can easily browse other websites and even explore your competitors. Youll eventually notice details if you are in the business for a while. Whether superb or inferior, a website can quickly grasp your attention with its speed. Either way, you might wonder who is hosting this website?
On the one hand, you might opt to get the same service, and on the other, you might want to avoid that web hosting company altogether obviously, thats if it delivers below-average results. Whatever the case, youll need a hosting checker to get this information on hand.
A WhoIs lookup might also come in handy if you want to transfer a domain that you have previously purchased. When you opt to use your existing domain, the new web host will ask for data provided by your old company. Usually, youll need to contact your then-current domain registrar to initiate a change of registrant. And since they are the ones to grant you a confirmation code, youll undoubtedly need to find out who is hosting your domain.
Furthermore, a website might be stealing your content. Once again, a WhoIs domain can help you file a DMCA takedown notice to the web hosting provider.
Important
In addition, youll get WhoIs lookup information, including domain registration and expiry date, WhoIs server, nameservers, and registrar information . It will be far easier for you to contact the website host with the contact details available.
Note
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A Quick Understanding Of Email
Before moving on, please make sure you understand a few things :
- Email can be web-based or client-based. Web based is like GMail. You use your web browser to view it. Client-based is like using Outlook, Apple Mail or Thunderbird its a separate program you start and its not in your web browser.
- If you use client-based email, you may have different sending and receiving hosts. You may login to one host to check/receive email and another host to send email.
- Your receiving email host is either using POP3 or IMAP.
- Your sending email host is using SMTP.
Email can be a little tricky but there is a path you can follow and get answers, so dont give up!
The 4 ways are below scroll on!
How Domain Name And Web Hosting Work
Domain and hosting work hand-in-hand imagine that both your IP address and the domain name act as your websites address, and web hosting is the actual house. Without web hosting, your site cant exist on the internet.
Therefore, you need to sync and point your domain name to your web hosting provider after you buy it.
To avoid too much hassle, we highly recommended purchasing a domain name and web hosting from the same place. This way, you dont need to worry about linking them manually, and you can start creating your website right away.
Lets briefly go over the steps of how to build a website and host it:
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What Is A Domain Registrar
A domain registrar is a company that has been certified by ICANN and given permission to buy and sell domains to businesses and end users.
Domain names can be purchased through domain registrars, though many businesses purchase them through the same company that provides their web hosting. In these cases, the web hosting company also acts as the registrar.
Alternatively, some companies host their websites on their own servers, either on-site or in the cloud. These companies dont need web hosting services, so can purchase domains directly from one of many domain registrars.
How To Check Who Hosts A Website
Lee StantonRead more October 14, 2021
Every website on the internet needs to have some kind of a host. If you want to find out who is hosting a particular website, it shouldnt be too hard, since this type of information is publicly available. You just might need to use a third-party app or a similar online tool to find out.
In this guide, well show you how to find out who hosts a website, whether its yours or someone elses. Well also explain why it might be useful to find out which web hosting service a website uses.
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Check Website Hosting Provider
Ops! Invalid Domain Name / IP.
Try another valid website domain name / IP.
About this tool:
The free online Web Hosting Checker tool allows users to check Who Is Hosting a particular website. Just enter the domain or IP to perform Web Hosting WHOIS. Grab your competitors by checking their hosting provider and identify the technologies used by them.
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What Is The Difference Between Web Hosting And The Registrar Of The Domain Name
Web hosting and domain name are two concepts that are often confusing. The domain name is the address of your website. To reserve a domain name, you have to go through a registrar.
Once the domain name is reserved, it is necessary to subscribe to a web hosting service in order to store the files of the site.
However, some companies offer both services, domain name registration as well as website hosting.
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Which Criteria Is Relevant When Choosing A Host
Before deciding which host offers the best package, you should first determine exactly what you need from the hosting solution. Not every provider offers the full range of features and services, but this is usually not necessary: the hosting provider thats right for you depends on the specific requirements and conditions of your web project. By comparing your requirements with what the different providers are offering, you increase your chances of finding the perfect solution. Here, we provide you with the most important criteria for choosing the right web hosting package which can vary greatly depending on your web project.
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Use Whois To Discover Who Hosts This Website
Who is what? WHOIS is the second step on the trail as we hunt down who hosts this website were after. You can simply go into terminal and type in whois domainname.dev. Be sure to replace domainname.dev with the actual domain in question.
If youre not comfortable with the terminal or command line, you can use GoDaddys free WHOIS lookup instead.
For this site, Ill be using my domain name, aaronreimann.com, and my dads domain name, jimreimann.com. Im using two different ones because each domain name can be a totally different. In this case, my dads domain is simple. I go into terminal, type in whois jimreimann.com, and heres what I get:
Its pretty straightforward: the registrar is GoGaddy and the DNS is A2 Web Hosting. If this were my client, I would need them to share their credentials for GoDaddy and A2 Web Hosting before I could log in to work on their site. But what if we enter whois aaronreimann.com?
Cloudflare isnt a web host. We cant see where its pointing through the WHOIS lookup. You can go to cloudflare.com to login, assuming your client can provide that login information. From there you will be able to get an A record that reveals where aaronreimann.com is really pointing.
If you need step-by-step instructions, GoDaddy has you covered with this useful help article. If none of this works, there are tools out there that do their best to tell you where something is hosted.
More Data Means Better Decisions
- The Internet thrives on free access to data. When you need to know web hosting information, we believe you deserve it now, and free of charge.
- Accurate web host data is critical in dealing with online copyright infringement. Its also helpful when choosing the best hosting provider for your website.
- Find out who is hosting any website, anytime. You deserve to know whats going on behind the scenes. Who Is Hosting This Website? delivers the details you need. Now. For free.
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How To Find Out Who Owns A Domain
You can find out who owns a domain by searching the WHOIS database to find key information such as registrant name, address status and phone number. Note some domains employ a privacy shield to hide such information.
Simply enter the URL for the domain name in question here:
Click the green Search button to find out information about the domain and who owns it. First, WHOIS will show basic information, like the domain name, ID, domain registrar server and URL, and creation date. You can see below that shopify.com was created on March 11, 2003, and is currently registered with .
You can also click View more information to expand the window and see more data about the domain name.
Now, you might notice that this information doesnt exactly take you directly to the domain owner. In fact, the domain name service acts as a go-between, essentially protecting the domain owners identity. That means youll need to do some extra research and sleuthing to find out who really owns the domain.
If the domain owners identity is hidden, look up information about the company that owns the domain. You might find a Contact Us or About Us page that talks about the companys leadership, founders, owners, etc.