How can I find out the "real" host domain of a site with domain masking?

Factual Questions
1

If a site has domain masking, is there a way to tell where it is really being hosted?

2

“Domain masking” is market-speak for a proxy server. The only way to find out the final destination is by examining the proxy’s configuration.

3

so you’re saying that i can’t do it.

4

i thought of something: I can ping the domain name and see where the IP address takes me, right?

5

Pinging the domain would simply return the IP of the proxy.