Peace, On Sun, Jul 28, 2019, 6:07 AM Ronald F. Guilmette via db-wg <db-wg@ripe.net> wrote:
there are sizable number of cases within the RIPE WHOIS data base where the relevant home country for the ASN is not present in the WHOIS record for the ASN [..]
Quite simply, I am suggesting that every resource record and every ORG record should include a country: line which itself should specify an ISO-3166 standardized country code, no exceptions.
---- cut ---- *4.2.4.2 Description of Attributes Specific to the INETNUM Object* *“country:” *– This identifies a country using the ISO 3166-2 letter country codes. It has never been specified what this country represents. It could be the location of the head office of a multi-national company or where the server centre is based or the home of the End User. Therefore, it cannot be used in any reliable way to map IP addresses to countries. ---- cut ---- Geolocating resources on the Internet has never been an easy task, with everyone also expecting a different meaning of "geolocating", ranging from finding the LIR HQ (which might be complicated whenever it's registered in the BVI) to locating the resource itself (which might be complicated in case of anycast). Therefore, geolocations in RIPE DB would always be confusing and unreliable for the foreseeable future. -- Töma