Documentation

RDAP Checks

About RDAP Checks

RDAP (Registration Data Access Protocol) is an HTTP query and response service that is used for querying domain registration information like nameservers and domain expiration dates.

When to Use RDAP Checks

RDAP Checks should be used to receive alerts before your domain expires. They should also be used to ensure your domain registrar has the proper nameservers configured for your domain.

For those running RDAP services, You can monitor your RDAP server by specifying it in the check. We will send you notifications when your RDAP server is unavailable or responding incorrectly.

Using RDAP Checks

To set up an RDAP check,

1. Give it a friendly label to identify this check in lists and notifications.
2. Select RDAP from the Check type drop down.
3. Enter the RDAP query in the 'RDAP Query' field. It must be a valid FQDN, ASN, or IP address:
   • example.com
   • 16276
   • 192.168.1.1
4. Enable Automated Diagnostics if you'd like detailed technical info about the failure that may help you troubleshoot a failure.
5. Set which geographical region you want the check to run from. The default is your account default region.
6. Set how often you want the check to run in the Interval field. The default is once an hour, the shortest is every hour due to query throttling by RDAP servers. If you're monitoring your own RDAP server and can whitelist our probes from throttling, we can modify the interval for your account down to 1 minute. Please contact support and request this feature for free.
7. Optionally set the number of days in advance of the domain expiration you would like to be alerted in the 'Warning Days' field. The default is 15 days. The check will fail when the expiration date crosses this threshold.
8. If you'd like to verify that particular words appear or do not appear in the RDAP response, type the words you're checking for into the optional 'Content Match' field and set it to either 'Contains' or 'Does not contain'. The match must be exact (case and line breaks included) in order to pass. Leave this blank to skip searching the response.
9. Optionally enter the RDAP server URL in the "RDAP server URL" field. Do not include the entity type (domain,ip,autnum) in the URL. If you leave this blank, we'll choose the appropriate RDAP URL for your query.
10. Optionally choose to force IPv6 or IPv4 resolution for the RDAP URL.
11. Set a time out. The default 5 seconds works fine for most situations.
12. Set the Sensitivity. High is usually appropriate but if you're seeing occasional timeout errors, set it lower.
13. Set the notifications for this check. More information about notifications.

Other Considerations

Because of RDAP query throttling on nearly all RDAP servers, the interval can only be set to 1 hour or more. If you are monitoring your own RDAP servers and would like shorter intervals and are willing to whitelist our probes from throttling, please contact support and we can allow your account down to 1 minute intervals.

Most RDAP replies are in JSON formatting. Something to consider when setting your 'Content Match'.