The time I went on live TV as an "Internet expert"

Back in 2007, I was living in Connecticut and working as a Senior Developer at Digital Surgeons. One day I called in to a TV show in Puerto Rico and went on live, introduced as an “Internet expert.”

The show was SuperXclusivo, with La Comay and Héctor Travieso. Back then it was Puerto Rico’s number one TV show.

What was going on #

A celebrity scandal had all of Puerto Rico talking, and a website was at the center of it.

On the show, the record for that website’s name had been shown as proof of who was behind it. I saw a problem with that, and I called in to explain it.

What I explained, in English #

Héctor asked me to explain it en chinas y botellas. That’s a Puerto Rican way of saying “in plain words, so everybody understands.” (It’s pretty much what I try to do on this whole site.)

Here’s what I said, in short:

• Anyone can register a website name. All you need is a credit card or PayPal.
• Once you own it, you can change the owner’s name in minutes. Some companies make you wait 24 hours, but that’s it.
• The record shows when it was last changed. This one said it was updated on July 1, 2007, after the name was first registered. So the name showing on TV wasn’t necessarily the name that was there at the start.
• The earlier name isn’t public. Getting it would take a records request through ICANN, the group that runs website names worldwide. That’s a job for lawyers.
• People with nothing to hide usually keep their real information on it. People who want to hide change it, or pay to keep it private.

Then Héctor asked me the big question: could someone put his name on a website just to hurt him?

Yes. That can be done.

I also made it clear I wasn’t there to defend anybody. I just wanted to bring some light to the case.

What a website’s record is #

Every website name, like ejrojas.com, has a public record. For years it was called the WHOIS record (“who is”).

Think of it like the registration for a car. It shows:

• The registrar: the company where the name was bought, like GoDaddy or Namecheap.
• The created date: when the name was first registered.
• The updated date: the last time anything on the record changed.
• The expiration date: when it has to be renewed.
• The owner’s contact information, if it isn’t hidden.

Can you trust the owner’s name? #

Not by itself. That was true in 2007, and it’s still true.

The owner’s name is whatever the person typed when they filled out the form. Nobody checks an ID. It can be a real name, a fake name, or someone else’s name.

The dates are different. The registrar’s system fills those in, not the owner. That’s why the “updated” date was the clue on the show.

How to look up a website’s record today #

Things changed since 2007. In 2018, new privacy laws in Europe led most companies to hide owners’ names and contact details. Today you’ll usually see “Redacted for privacy” or the name of a privacy company.

The old WHOIS system was also replaced in 2025 by a newer one called RDAP. You don’t need to know how it works. The lookup is still free and easy:

1. Go to lookup.icann.org (opens in a new tab).
2. Type the website name, like example.com, and press Lookup.
3. Look at the dates: created, updated, and expiration.
4. Look at the registrar: the company where it was bought.