Domain hijack by Whois research?

Paranoia about Whois Hijacks are as old as the service itself.
How can you be sure that your favourite Whois site does not hijack your domain research? You can't!
They might as well log all queries to a database, check the value each available domains and register every valueable domain which is available before you have the chance to register it yourself.

Larry Seltzer of eWeek.com has found out about a company called Chesterton Holdings which lives by this concept. They managed to get ahold of the CNet Whois query and happily register every domain they come across, let it rest for 4 days and delete it within the 5 days grace period for domain registrars at zero cost. Automatic domain squatting at its best. As an actual user, you have no chance.