Can change of domain ownership effect PR?

Does Google spider WHOIS info

[pauldmitri]

Hi,

I have the opportunity to buy a domain from someone that has nice PR that I intend on using for link building. The owner is totally cool with me simply copying the existing content and leaving it up as is.

I have heard some people say that Google spiders the WHOIS info and a change of ownership can trigger certain penalties.

Does anyone know about this?

[tedster]

First thing to note is that Google is now a registrar - they don't need to spider the public WhoIs records anymore, they're on the inside looking out!

From the 2005 Google Patent [appft1.uspto.gov] we know that they plan to monitor "stability of the dns data" as well as all kinds of "signals [that] may be used to distinguish between illegitimate and legitimate domains" including "whether contact information for the domain changes relatively often."

My experience recently is that a change of ownership, if
1) that's the only new factor, and...
2) the new owner has no "bad history" with Google, and especially if...
3) the content doesn't change at all immediately following the new ownership

...then no problems with continued ranking. PR itself would not be affected even if some kind of "watchfulness filter" were placed on the domain for a period.