신뢰 및 안전 제품/임시 계좌/FAQ
The basics of temporary accounts
What is a temporary account?
Any time you publish an edit on Wikipedia or other sites hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation without logging into a registered account, a temporary account will be created for you. This account will automatically be given a username. A cookie will be set in your browser when the account is created. All subsequent edits by you will be attributed to the username assigned to this temporary account, even if your IP address changes. With a temporary account, your IP address can only be accessed by authorized staff and community members, as outlined in the updated Privacy policy.
How do temporary accounts work?
- 임시 계정 이름은
~2026-12345-6(물결표, 현재 연도, 자동 생성 번호) 형식을 따릅니다. 사용자는 임시 계정의 이름을 선택하거나 변경할 수 없습니다. - 생성일로부터 90일이 지나면 임시 계정이 자동으로 만료됩니다. 이후에는 사용할 수 없어서 토론 문서의 메시지를 받지 못합니다. Edits made will still be tracked by page histories and logs, and the talk page of the temporary account will also remain available. However, the user will no longer be able to use that account or receive notifications for messages posted on its talk page.
- 편집을 계속한다면 새 임시 계정이 할당됩니다. 이전 임시 계정은 비활성화되며, 이 계정을 유지하거나 이를 통해 로그인할 수 없습니다. It will be permanently inactive. The only indication the account has expired is it is no longer used. There is no flag or message indicating whether a temporary account has expired or not.
- 임시 계정에 로그인할 수 없으며, 임시 계정에는 비밀번호가 없습니다.
- 비록 IP 주소가 바뀌더라도(예: 집이나 커피숍에서 편집하는 경우), 같은 장치와 브라우저에서 이루어진 모든 편집은 같은 임시 계정으로 나타납니다. 이는 할당된 임시 계정을 브라우저 쿠키가 인식하기 때문입니다.
- 임시 계정은 기록을 검색하거나 탭을 여는 것과는 다릅니다. 브라우저가 여러 기기에서 동기화되어 있더라도, 기기마다 서로 다른 계정이 할당됩니다. 브라우저가 그러한 원리로 작동하기 떄문입니다. 임시 계정이 걱정된다면 계정을 등록해 보세요.
- 임시 계정은 세션을 종료하거나 브라우저 쿠키를 삭제하여 언제든지 수동으로 비활성화할 수 있습니다.
Notable aspects of temporary accounts
- 임시 계정은 등록된 계정과 다릅니다. 일정 시간 동안만 활성화되며, 제한된 기능만 사용할 수 있습니다. 또한 임시 계정에 대해서 등록된 계정의 편집과 동일한 수준으로 데이터를 수집합니다.[명확한 설명 필요]
- 임시 계정은 로그인한 사용자에게 제공되는 모든 기능을 이용할 수 없습니다. 공용에 사진을 업로드하는 등 일부 작업은 등록된 계정 사용자만 할 수 있습니다.
- 임시 계정에는 자체 사용자 및 사용자 토론 문서가 생성되지만, 결국 해당 페이지는 생성한 사용자와 연결이 끊어지게 됩니다. In general, a temporary account and a (subsequent) regular user account could be linked. But because of the possible delink, it is technically not allowed in some projects to edit the user page of a temporary account after it has expired or was permanently blocked.
- 임시 계정은 알림을 받으므로 사용자 토론 문서에 온 새로운 메시지 안내도 받습니다.
- 임시 계정은 로그인한 편집자로부터 감사 표현을 받을 수 있지만, 할 수는 없습니다.
- 임시 계정은 다른 사용자에게 답장을 보낼 수 있으며, 반대로 답장을 받을 수도 있습니다.
See also
- Help page for the temporary account holders (temporary users)
- The technical information page if your bot or tool needs to differentiate between temporary and permanent account types
The basics of the project
Why are you working on temporary accounts at all?
Primarily, to improve the privacy of logged-out users. In addition, this change will allow us to build better anti-abuse tools.
Our wikis should be safer to edit by default for logged-out editors. Temporary accounts allow people to continue editing the wikis without creating an account, while avoiding publicly tying their edits to their IP address. We believe this is in the best interest of our logged-out editors, who make valuable contributions to the wikis and who may later create accounts and grow our community. Even though the wikis do warn logged-out editors that their IP address will be associated with their edit, many people may not understand what an IP address is, or that it could be used to connect them to other information about them in ways they might not expect.
Additionally, our moderation software and tools rely too heavily on network origin (IP addresses) to identify users and patterns of activity, especially as IP addresses themselves are becoming less stable as identifiers. Temporary accounts allow for more precise interactions with logged-out editors, including more precise blocks, and can help limit how often we unintentionally end up blocking good-faith users who use the same IP addresses as bad-faith users.
Why is a temporary account the right solution to the problem?
There are some hard requirements that led to the design of the temporary accounts. Some of them are of legal, and some are of technical nature:
| What we are facing | What we have decided to do |
|---|---|
| One of the founding principles of our movement is that people should be able to make most simple edits without registering a permanent account. | Temporary accounts will be created automatically (people won't need to create an account themselves). |
| Due to legal requirements, edits on the wikis should be attributed to a user identifier other than IP address. | If temporary accounts are enabled on a wiki, an account is created for a user as soon as they commit their first edit. The user is automatically logged in to this account, which is tied to a randomly generated username. This username is displayed in every situation (except for various functionary tools) where IP addresses would have otherwise been displayed. |
| The identifier that a given not logged-in user's edits are attributed to needs to be stable. Creating a new user for each edit is not an option. Otherwise, there would be a too large rate of new users. | As soon as the temporary account is created, the user is logged in. The cookie has a limited lifetime. Within this duration, if the user decides to make more edits, they are all attributed to the same temporary account. A new one is created if the user decides to log out of the temporary account or otherwise use a different browser. The user retains the same temporary account if they change IP address while using the same device/browser. |
| The MediaWiki software can't be changed too much. We need to limit novelties to let existing features work unmodified. | A temporary account does not break anything in the way user accounts are handled. Apart from the necessary exceptions (such as features that need to be disabled for temporary accounts), most code will continue to work normally. |
See also:
Would banning IP editing be a good alternative?
[Edit Dec 15, 2025: We updated our response here, to more precisely describe the state of research here and WMF’s views.]
We don’t have conclusive data one way or the other.
On two occasions, Wikimedia communities have established a consensus to ban IP editing for articles: Portuguese Wikipedia in October 2020 (still in effect) and Farsi Wikipedia in October 2021 (ended April 2022).
The changes introduced by the Portuguese and Farsi Wikipedias presented opportunities to evaluate the impact that requiring account creation has on editing and moderating activities. We studied the effects on these communities, releasing a report on Farsi Wikipedia’s experience in August 2022, and several reports (first one, second one) on Portuguese Wikipedia’s ongoing experience, with the most recent one in 2025.
The results are a mixed bag, with some evidence indicating reduced moderator burden, and some evidence indicating reduced overall content growth. However, because they were observational studies, we were not able to rely on the kinds of controls and data collection methods used in controlled experiments. In addition, we recognize that Wikimedia communities are unique; features and policies can impact them in different ways.
As a result, we don’t have clear evidence of how important logged-out editing is for the growth and health of volunteer communities. Even so, WMF’s perspective is that logged-out editing is a founding principle for a reason – that Wikipedia and our other projects are built on not caring who you are or where you came from, but inviting you to participate anyway, right away.
That immediate and complete invitation to contribute remains exceptionally rare and surprising on the modern internet. It does come with the risk of more bad-faith editors. But we think it is likely that the ability to edit without creating an account has led to more people trying to edit for the first time, and more people eventually creating accounts, sticking around, and becoming respected editors.
Now that temporary accounts are deployed just about everywhere, we’re working closely with the members of our community who spend their volunteer time fighting abuse to streamline their work. Our goal is to keep the door open to editing without an account, and to make it manageable for communities to deal with abuse so that that continues to be the right choice.
Where are temporary accounts deployed? When will these changes reach my wiki?
Temporary accounts are already available on the following wikis:
- 체코어 위키배움터, 덴마크어 위키백과, 페르시아어 위키낱말사전, 이그보어 위키백과, 이탈리아어 위키인용집, 일본어 위키책, 노르웨이어 보크몰 위키백과, 루마니아어 위키백과, 세르비아어 위키백과, 세르보크로아트어 위키백과, 스와힐리어 위키백과, Cantonese Wikipedia (/),
- 아제르바이잔어 위키백과, 아랍어 위키백과, 체코어 위키백과, 독일어 위키백과, 페르시아어 위키백과, 프랑스어 위키백과, 히브리어 위키백과, 힌디어 위키백과, 인도네시아어 위키백과, 일본어 위키백과, 한국어 위키백과, 네덜란드어 위키백과, 폴란드어 위키백과, 포르투갈어 위키백과, 튀르키예어 위키백과, 우크라이나어 위키백과, 베트남어 위키백과, 중국어 위키백과, 미디어위키 ().
- "Other Wikimedia projects" ().
- Most wikis. From this point on, the team defines a list of wikis with temporary accounts not enabled – T402181 ().
- All wikis except one. (/).
See also: T340001.
What if a community wants to keep using IP addresses?
With temporary accounts being introduced on a wiki, displaying IP addresses for subsequent contributions becomes no longer permitted. All communities need to prepare for the change to temporary accounts.
Is the Wikimedia Foundation monitoring the effect of using temporary accounts on the communities?
Yes.
There is a public dashboard for monitoring metrics for the pilot wikis. All these statistics are updated very frequently, for instance, real-time or once every day, to give everyone a good visibility of the actual work of temporary accounts on wikis.
The following specific metrics are publicly available:
Public metrics in detail
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In addition, the Foundation is monitoring some other metrics which for security or privacy reasons are not public. These include data like the number of requests for assistance from CheckUsers. We will periodically share reports about the non-public metrics.
Non-public (guardrail) metrics in detail
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Administrator actions (across all wikis)
Administrator requests
Administrator health
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IP addresses appear in the history of many pages. Will those past uses be modified?
No.
Historical IP addresses that were published on wiki before the switch to temporary accounts will not be modified. The Wikimedia Foundation Legal department has approved this decision.
Does the introduction of temporary accounts reduce the motivation for users to create a registered account?
With temporary accounts users can be notified and thanked for their contribution. This can hopefully drive up their engagement. For example, a user who makes a drive-by edit being thanked with a message on their talk page may realize the opportunity to interact with the community. We want to periodically nudge them to create a registered account. We hope this can help retain them and push them to create accounts that they wouldn't have otherwise.
Will temporary accounts be affected by the global IP blocks? Will users still be assigned temp accounts if they're using a VPN, or will the block prevent that? How will this affect VPN users?
There is no change in this regard. If an IP address or IP range is globally blocked, the rules of the block will dictate whether unregistered users can edit or not. Temporary accounts will be treated the same as IP editors were treated prior to the introduction of temporary accounts. The same applies to VPN users.
Legal details about temporary accounts
What specific legal requirements, regulations or risks are you worried about? Is the Foundation facing legal action? What would happen if we didn't introduce temporary accounts?
We shouldn't provide all the information. We shouldn't publish some details, and we shouldn't disclose why. If we publicly discussed what arguments we can make, or what risks are most likely to result in litigation, we could help someone harm the wikis and the communities.
This answer is based on attorney advice we are choosing to follow.
Can this change be rolled out differently by location?
No.
We protect the privacy of all users to the same standard. This will change across the Wikimedia projects.
If we tell someone their IP address will be published, isn't that enough?
No.
Many people have been confused to see their IP address published. Additionally, even when someone does see the notice, the Foundation has to properly handle their personal data. Publishing the IP addresses of non-logged-in editors falls short of current privacy best practices. Also, it creates risks, including risks to those users.
How does the project affect CC license attribution?
It does not affect it.
The 3.0 license for text on the Wikimedia projects already states that attribution should include "the name of the Original Author (or pseudonym, if applicable)" (see the license at section 4c). Use of the temporary account names will function equally well as a pseudonym. IP addresses already may vary or be assigned to different people over time, so their use to identify unregistered editors is no different in this respect from the use of temporary account names. Both satisfy the license pseudonym requirement. In addition, our Terms of use section 7 specify that as part of contributing to Wikipedia, editors agree that links to articles (which include article history) are a sufficient method of attribution.
Technical details about temporary accounts
Where can I test it?
- All beta cluster wikis except en-rtl Wikipedia
- test.wikipedia.org
- test2.wikipedia.org
Keep in mind that these are testing wikis. Software there may not work as expected.
In addition, users with advanced permissions may test different features on Patch Demo available on T369637.
How long does a temporary account last?
A temporary account will work for as long as the cookie exists. The cookie is currently set to expire three months after the first edit.
The following are the most common scenarios in which a temporary account will be irretrievably lost:
- The user clears the cookies on the browser.
- The user deletes the profile on their browser that they used when the temporary account was created.
- The user used an incognito (private browsing) window, and closed the window.
- The cookie expired.
If a temporary account is lost, then a new temporary account, with a new username, will be automatically generated the next time the user publishes an edit. If a user would like a permanent account, they can create a free registered account at any time.
What happens if the software can't set the temporary-account cookie?
If it's not possible to set a cookie, for example the browser is configured to block all cookies, the editor would have their edit saved successfully. However, the temporary account would be a single-use one, and it would be deleted immediately.
I support privacy protections, but why does this involve tracking cookies?
This cookie is not a tracking cookie.
Tracking cookies are used to track your browser history and activities, typically across multiple websites. We are adding a cookie to attribute your editing activities to the same username across multiple IP addresses and multiple websites (all SUL-connected wikis). It is a lot like a tracking cookie, but we’ve chosen not to call it that.
Does the temporary accounts system work the same way across different devices, or is it only reliable in desktop browsers?
Temporary accounts should work equally well on phones, tablets, and desktop devices. A temporary account is tied to both a browser and device. As long as those don't change, the temporary account will persist.
Are the temporary usernames unique across different wikis?
Yes.
If you see User:~2024-1234567 at multiple SUL-connected wikis, you can be confident that this is the same account.
Why is the year included in the temporary account username?
We decided to include the year in the name so that it is easier to identify newer accounts from older ones. You will also notice expired usernames appear struck out for the same reason.
How many accounts do you expect will be generated? Is there a limit to how high that number can go?
We do not anticipate this to be a problem:
- Temporary account creation is rate limited. This means it's not possible to abuse account creation with automated scripts.
- Because the temporary account usernames are prefixed with the year, at the start of every year the username gets a "reset". This way the username cannot get very long.
Have you considered that the tilde character isn't simply available on keyboards?
Yes, accessing the tilde character (~) is not easy on mobile phone keyboards.
It is available through the symbols menu.
Unfortunately, this is the case for most symbols.
We wanted to minimize renaming existing accounts and avoid characters that could interfere with URLs or hold special meaning.
After assessing many prefix options (see T332805) we chose the tilde.
What if temporary accounts are only enabled on some wikis?
Some wikis have temporary accounts enabled (pilots) and others do not.
Wikis that have temporary accounts enabled display unregistered editors as temporary accounts. On non-temp-accounts wikis they still show up as IP addresses. When the temporary user switches between these wikis they will show up as a temporary account in one wiki and as an IP address in another.
This may create a problem with some features that rely on having a persistent user identity across wikis. If your feature(s) are impacted by this change, please come talk to us on the talk page or through Phabricator.
Access to IP addresses – who has the right
Who is able to see the IP address of temporary accounts?
Stewards, CheckUsers, global sysops, admins, and other community members who meet qualifying thresholds and are granted the right by their community admins, as well as certain staff at the Wikimedia Foundation.
There are privacy risks associated with IP addresses. This is why they will be visible only to people who need to have that information for effective investigation or prevention of different policy violations.
See also:
- Access to temporary account IP addresses legal policy
I have a qualified account. How can I see the IP addresses?
Please follow your community's guidelines to request this right from admins and/or bureaucrats and/or stewards (as defined by your community). Once you have been granted this right you may go to the page Special:Preferences, find the section 임시 계정 IP 표시, check the checkbox, and hit Save. Please read the note:
이 설정을 활성화하기 전에 "임시 계정의 IP 주소 접근 정책"을 읽고 동의해야 합니다. 특히 다음 내용을 숙지하십시오:위키미디어 재단이나 커뮤니티 정책의 문서 훼손, 악용, 스팸, 괴롭힘, 방해 행위 및 기타 위반에 대한 조사 또는 집행에 합리적으로 필요한 경우를 제외하고는 임시 계정의 IP 주소에 대한 정보에 접근, 사용 또는 공개해서는 안 됩니다. 다른 사람과 정보를 공유하는 경우, 어디서 어떻게 공유하는지에 주의해야 하며, 다른 사람이 볼 필요가 더 이상 없을 때 해당 정보를 제거해야 합니다.
임시 계정의 IP 정보를 볼 수 있는 다른 사용자들이 당신이 이 환경 설정을 켰음을 볼 수 있습니다.
Will I need to sign any non-disclosure agreement?
You do not have to sign any separate document; you just opt-in, and thereby confirm that you will follow the relevant policies and legal guidelines.
There is the access to nonpublic personal data policy (ANPDP). It is a legal policy from the Wikimedia Foundation about how checkusers and people with certain other roles must protect non-public personal data that they obtain in the course of their duties. Volunteer admins and patrollers do not need to sign it. However, you will need to opt-in to access to IP addresses through Special:Preferences at your local wiki.
편집자는 이 새로운 사용자 권한을 어떻게 신청합니까?
This is automatically assigned to users who have permissions related to anti-abuse tasks, as defined in the policy. 기본적으로 자격이 있는 사용자에게 자동으로 할당됩니다. 당신이 해야 할 유일한 일은 당신의 위키에서 사용할 수 있을 때 옵트인하는 것입니다.
Other users need to apply for the right, and administrators or stewards can grant these rights.
The Wikimedia Foundation is not requiring a process equivalent to becoming an admin in the largest communities. Communities may choose to handle these requests via their existing processes, or to set up new pages. 예를 들어, 영어 위키백과는 $enwiki에서 요청을 받도록 선택할 수 있고, 독일어 위키백과는 $dewiki에서 요청을 처리하도록 선택할 수 있으며, 우크라이나어 위키백과는 $ukwiki에서 요청을 처리하도록 선택할 수 있습니다. 매우 작은 커뮤니티는 종종 사랑방에서 유사한 요청을 받습니다. Very small communities often take similar requests on their village pump.
For "other users" (as they are categorized in the policy), is it possible to bundle this right with an existing group, like patrollers?
No, at least not currently. This is what we announced in May 2025:
- Separation of the new right (
checkuser-temporary-account) out to a new group (Temporary account IP viewers), as opposed to technically attaching it to any existing group (like patroller). We have decided to do this for a few reasons:- Having access to IP addresses carries risk. This right is similar to checkuser. IP addresses are considered personally identifiable information (a kind of personal data). Outside actors who want to access IP addresses will now need to interact with users who have this right. Users with this right should be aware of this, and alert to the possibility of suspicious access requests.
- Good practices for privacy protection. Giving access to users who are trusted but do not need access to carry on their work is not in line with good practices for processing personal data.
- Removal of right. Access to IPs will be logged (example). If any misuse of this right is detected, it can be taken away separately from any other permissions the user may hold. It would be difficult and sometimes also unreasonable to remove the rights unrelated to access to IP addresses.
- You may grant the new right to all users belonging to a certain existing group individually. These users must meet the criteria for Temporary account IP viewers, though.
- For clarity – all this does not affect administrators, bureaucrats, checkusers, stewards, and other groups mentioned in the global policy.
We have also documented this decision in Limits to configuration changes.
우리 커뮤니티는 더 높은 요구 사항을 설정하기를 원합니다. 어떻게 하죠?
다만 위키마다 개별 검토가 필요한 프로세스 등 최소 기준보다 높은 기준으로 자체 프로세스를 설정할 수 있다. 위키미디어 재단은 대규모 커뮤니티에서 관리자가 되는 것과 같은 프로세스를 요구하지 않습니다. 커뮤니티는 기존 프로세스를 통해 이러한 요청을 처리하거나 새 페이지를 설정하도록 선택할 수 있습니다. Make sure that consensus of your community does not contradict the global policy, and instead, adds requirements of your choice to the global ones.
언제 사용자 권한을 사용할 수 있습니까? 언제 할당을 시작할 수 있습니까?
사용자 권한은 올해 말(2023년)에 미디어위키 소프트웨어에 추가될 가능성이 높지만 처음에는 모든 위키에서 유용하지는 않을 것입니다. 원하는 경우 개별 검토가 필요한 프로세스를 사용하려는 커뮤니티는 언제든지 사전 승인 편집자를 시작할 수 있습니다.
관리자가 아닌 사용자의 최소 요구 사항이 너무 높습니다
이것은 위키가 새로 만들어지는 경우와 같이 때때로 사실일 수 있습니다. 그러한 경우 해당 위키의 누군가가 위키미디어 재단 법무 부서에 예외를 요청해야 합니다. 커뮤니티 상황에 대한 설명과 함께 $email-address로 연락하십시오. In such cases, contact the stewards.
저는 관리자이지만 이 사용자 권한을 원하지 않습니다
동의를 클릭하지 않으면 이 정보를 볼 수 없습니다.
누군가 이 정보를 오용하고 있다고 생각합니다
감찰위원회에 개인 정보 보호 관련 문제를 보고하십시오. 책임성을 보장하기 위해 도구 사용 및 사용자가 도구에 접근할 수 있는 로그가 보관됩니다.
오용 가능성에 대한 다른 우려 사항은 사무장에 요청하여 관리자에게 제기할 수 있습니다. 사무장은 오용이 발생했다고 판단하는 경우 IP 주소에 대한 사용자의 접근을 차단할 권한이 있습니다. 이렇게 하면 사용자가 자동으로 자격이 있거나 커뮤니티 프로세스를 통해 접근 권한이 부여된 경우에도 접근이 차단됩니다.
If someone is blocked, are they able to use this right?
If a user is blocked sitewide, the software won't let them reveal IP addresses. If they have a partial block, they are able to use this right.
Access to IP addresses – moderation workflows and blocking
What happens if a temporary account is associated with multiple IP addresses?
When a user reveals the IP address of a temporary account from a history/log page, in most cases the IP revealed is the one responsible for that specific action. To view a temporary account's editing history, one can use the page Special:IPInfo which is linked from the temporary account's contributions page.
What if a temporary account holder needs to be blocked?
Temporary accounts' IPs will be stored for a period of 90 days. IP addresses can still be blocked. Temporary accounts can also be independently blocked, including global blocks and autoblocks.
Can't an abuser just clear cookies?
Yes, they can. Temporary accounts are not intended to solve any anti-abuse problems.
We know the problem of abusers making edits through a pool of changing IPs while masking browser agent data. This cannot be solved through temporary accounts. This is not a design goal for this project either. Otherwise, we would need to use trusted tokens, disabling anonymous edits, or fingerprinting, all of which are very involved, complicated measures that have significant community and technical considerations.
We have adapted tools to ensure that trusted functionaries can safely and efficiently navigate the bidirectional mappings between temporary accounts within the last 90 days and IPs. However, abuse from a user who clears cookies may become difficult or impossible to detect and mitigate for users without advanced permissions, or if some of the edits involved are more than 90 days old.
If a user clears their browser cookies but continues using the same IP address, will there be any way to connect them back to their previous temporary account?
Especially in shared environments like universities and schools, where multiple unrelated users might be using the same IP, how will the system handle that?
If a user clears their cookies and edits again, they will be granted a new temporary account. This can only happen a maximum of six times per day after which the account creation limit will be reached. Users who have access to view temporary account IP addresses will be able to make the connection between IPs and temporary accounts through the page Special:IPContributions.
Will temporary accounts be covered by the autoblock mechanism?
Autoblocks stop vandals and other high-risk users from continuing to disrupt the projects by immediately creating a new account. Autoblocks for temporary accounts are the same as autoblocks for registered users. (IP addresses are not available to the public.)
More information is available in phab:T332231. Temporary accounts can also be blocked via global autoblocks.
How to do moderation work without exposing other users' private data?
We have a few tips, both for community members who can't block other users, and for admins:
- We recommend focusing on asking admins to block temporary accounts instead of asking to block both temporary accounts and IPs. This is because often, it suffices to only block temporary accounts.
- If a temporary account is blocked with autoblocking enabled, the IP they were using will be blocked for 24 hours. If a temporary account user doesn't switch IPs, there isn't a need to block their IP unless the block needs to be longer than 24 hours.
- If a user is using many temporary accounts over multiple IPs, we recommend to also ask to block the IPs. We discourage from writing down the IP addresses themselves as part of the request, though.
- We discourage from linking registered accounts and temporary accounts publicly. It would allow non-CheckUsers establish the registered account IP.
- Some connections may be traced by analyzing public logs. This is a trade-off. We limit access to different logs, but it's not always the best solution.
The current configuration of temporary accounts will make retro-patrolling impossible
Currently, the 90-day period after which the IP address of a temporary account becomes inaccessible seems reasonably long. We have consulted the Stewards on this. If you can demonstrate a need for a longer period, contact us. We are open to extending this period.
In any case, the 90-day limit doesn't apply to behavioral evidence or patterns of editing – these will continue to be visible. The number itself may be changed, and we will be paying attention to your thoughts and evidence of more difficult investigation. It is important to note that for instances of proven long-term abuse behaviors, we can publicly document the IP address for patrolling needs.
Access to IP addresses – documentation
Some communities currently have public pages for documenting the activities of some bad actors, including their IP addresses (e.g., Long-term abuse). Will this documentation still be permitted?
Yes.
The communities should treat the IPs of logged in users and temporary account holders the same on the Long-term abuse list. They may list the IP addresses when necessary, but they should refer to the abusers by their temporary account usernames.
See also:
Can we publicly document the IP addresses used by suspected (but not confirmed) bad actors who are using temporary accounts?
In general, no, but sometimes yes, temporarily.
When possible, patrollers with access to IP addresses should document the temporary account name(s) instead of the IP addresses. The exception is when the IP addresses are necessary for the purpose of protecting the wiki from abusive actions. Necessity should be determined on a case-by-case basis. If a disclosure later becomes unnecessary, then the IP address should be promptly removed.
For example, if a suspected vandal is exonerated during an investigation, then the report showing the user's IP address can be removed through oversight. That way, the IP address is only revealed while it is needed, and then is suppressed later, after it has been shown to not be needed any longer. See the related policy for more information.
When it comes to documenting connections between logged-in and temporary users, non-CheckUser-level evidence, like editing patterns may be documented publicly. Documenting publicly that a temporary account and a regular account are connected based on evidence restricted for CheckUsers would be against the policy, even if IP addresses wouldn't be documented.
If other information about non-logged-in contributors is revealed (such as location, or ISP), then it doesn't matter if the IP address is also published, right?
No. The IP address should not be published.
With temporary accounts, the public information will not be linked to an individual person or device. For example, it will be a city-level location, or a note that an edit was made by someone at a particular university. While this is still information about the user, it's less specific and individual than an IP address. So even though we are making some information available to assist with abuse prevention, we are protecting the privacy of that specific contributor better.
Experienced contributor questions
Where can I test how my advanced permissions work with temporary accounts?
Users with advanced permissions may test different features on Patch Demo available on T369637.
Is there a limitation for creating many temporary accounts from the same IP address?
Yes.
There are limits preventing from creating too many accounts from the same IP address too quickly.
- The current threshold for regular accounts is six per IP address per day (
$wgAccountCreationThrottle). - In addition to that, there is a similar limitation for temporary accounts, which is also six per IP address per day (
$wgTempAccountCreationThrottle). - We have also introduced a limit of one temporary account creation every 10 minutes. (T405565)
These thresholds can be changed if necessary.
We have investigated the ideal thresholds of the limit (T357771). We will check nuanced responses to tripping thresholds, including CAPTCHAs, temporary blocks, calls to create an account, etc. During the entire rollout, we will analyze rate limit trips (T357763). To learn more, see T357776.
With temporary accounts, can we now communicate with unregistered users through their talk pages, and will those messages remain available for 90 days?
Messages on talk pages will not disappear after 90 days. Any conversation and messages left on their talk pages will remain.
Will the issue of warnings being sent out to the wrong person, due to shared IP addresses, be resolved with temporary accounts?
Temporary account holders can receive notifications like mentions, talk page messages or thanks just like any registered account. Since temporary accounts do not change when IPs change, the likelihood that the intended user will see the notification is significantly higher.
What are the functional differences between using a Special:CheckUser on a temporary account, and revealing the IP address?
Unlike Special:CheckUser, using the IP reveal feature only shows you IP address information. This includes the IP address used for a particular edit by a particular temporary account, the last IP address used by a temporary account, all the IP addresses used by a temporary account, or all the temporary accounts edits on a given IP address or IP address range.
Why are there so many temporary accounts with zero edits?
Temporary accounts can exist with zero edits in a few situations. The first is if a temporary account is created on one wiki and then opens a different wiki in the same wiki-farm. Opening another wiki autocreates an account for them on that wiki.
Additionally, temporary accounts are not created at the moment of a successful edit save, but at the moment of any save attempt. AbuseFilter may prevent the edit from being saved. These attempts need to be logged, and in the log, each attempt needs to be assigned to a performer. This is why an account needs to be created.
It's also created when a null edit is made, if there is no abuse filter, spam blacklist or blocked domain hit logs.
What does 'Legacy IP edits' mean, visible in Special:Contributions and related pages?
This refers to edits by anonymous users before temporary accounts were enabled, whose IP addresses are visible in their usernames.
Do temporary accounts see Sitenotice or Anonnotice banners?
Temporary accounts get to see messages from MediaWiki:Sitenotice, and not MediaWiki:Anonnotice.
Are temporary accounts welcomed by Extension:NewUserMessage?
No. Temporary accounts are not registered accounts, and they are not welcomed by NewUserMessage.
See also
- 도움말:임시 계정 – a help page for temporary account holders (temporary users)
- Wikimedia Access to Temporary Account IP Addresses Policy
- Documentation for developers
- Help:Extension:CheckUser
- Manual:$wgAutoCreateTempUser – to enable this for your own wiki