WickedGov:Protection policy

Protection is the technical process by which editing, moving, and/or creating a page or uploading a file is restricted to specific users.

A primary goal of WickedGov is to allow all users the ability to contribute, even when they are not logged in. However, some users may attempt to vandalize or otherwise damage WickedGov. When this occurs, warning and then blocking is the first line of defense; protection is best avoided if possible since it precludes constructive edits as well as vandalism. This policy describes when protection is permissible and which level of protection should be used.

Semi-protection

The indicator for semi-protection

Semi-protection is the protection of a page from editing or moving by unregistered and new users, specifically those who are not autoconfirmed. Autoconfirmation is automatically granted to any registered user who registered at least three days ago and has made at least five edits. Users may be manually autoconfirmed by an administrator or bureaucrat prior to reaching this requirement. However, this is generally not granted unless the account is an authorized alternate account of an autoconfirmed user.

Semi-protection shall be applied whenever:

• The page is subject to persistent vandalism, spam, or other disruption from new or unregistered accounts, and warnings or blocks have not been effective at alleviating the problem.
• There is ongoing edit warring at the page, all warring users are non-autoconfirmed, and warnings or blocks have been ineffective.
• There is community consensus to impose semi-protection.

Extended protection

The indicator for extended protection

Extended protection restricts access to users in the extendedconfirmed user group. This group is granted automatically to any user who has had a registered account for at least 14 days and has made at least 100 edits. The 14-day period begins when a user publishes their first edit. Administrators and bots can also edit extended-protected pages.

Users should not make many useless edits to reach the 100-edit mark; this is considered gaming the system and will result in revocation of the permissions by a bureaucrat or administrator.

Extended protection can be applied in the following cases:

• Semi-protected pages that continue to be disrupted by autoconfirmed users.
• Whenever the criteria for full protection are met, but a less restrictive protection level will still be sufficient.
• There is community consensus to impose extended protection.

Full protection

The indicator for full protection

Full protection results in all users being prohibited from editing a page, except for administrators. Due to the restrictive nature of this protection level, it should only be used in the following cases:

• Files or templates with many or prominent uses (see below).
• Files or templates used in system messages.
• The Main Page.
• As a temporary emergency measure to prevent vandalism, edit warring, or other issues, but only when there is no good alternative.
• Pages which have been subject to disruption and are unlikely to require constructive editing. Examples may include userpages of inactive users, redirect pages, and blank category pages.
• Pages where editing must be restricted due to privacy or legal concerns.
• There is community consensus to impose full protection.

Protection of high-risk templates and files

As a preventative measure, templates with many transclusions and files with many uses may be protected at any level from semi-protection to full protection. This is justified for multiple reasons:

• Vandalism on these pages would affect a large number of other pages.
• Excessive editing to these templates may affect server performance.

When choosing a level of protection under this section, administrators should balance the importance of community editing with the visibility level of the page.

Office protection

The indicator for office protection

Office protection allows editing only from staff members. This protection is available at the discretion of the office, and may be used in cases such as:

• Policies and other pages that need to remain static for legal reasons.
• Pages that temporarily need to be protected to maintain the legal integrity of the wiki, such as when a copyright holder has issued a DMCA complaint.

Administrators are not technically permitted to add or remove this protection level. The office will communicate and cooperate with the community on the use of this feature whenever possible.

All pages in the Policy: namespace are permanently office-protected. These pages contain important legal policies that must not be changed without thorough consideration.

Protection from moving

The indicator for move protection

It is uncommon for pages to be protected from moving (renaming) but not from editing. Pages should not be indiscriminately protected from moving.

These pages should generally be fully protected from moving:

• Pages subject to page-move vandalism or edit warring.
• Any page featured very prominently, such as content linked from the Main Page or from the sidebar.
• Pages protected from editing. Any page protected from editing will receive at least the same move protection level. This is because the MediaWiki software considers moving to be a form of editing.

Semi-protection from moving is rarely effective, since the right to move pages is already restricted to registered users. Nevertheless, semi-protection or extended protection from moving can be used if it is sufficient to address the problem.

Non-protection restrictions on editing

• "System messages" can be edited only by administrators and interface editors. System messages form most of the text used by the MediaWiki software, such as the copyright message under the editing window and the links in the sidebar.
• Sitewide CSS and JavaScript code can be edited only by interface editors. This is because maliciously changing the frontend code can potentially cause some serious harm, such as compromising user accounts.
• For the same reasons as above, the CSS and JavaScript used by other accounts is restricted to interface editors. Any registered user can create and edit their own interface code.
• Unregistered users are not allowed to edit any user page. To create and edit user pages, create an account.

General policy on protection

• An administrator should never use protection to gain an advantage in an editing dispute.
• Protections due to edit-warring should be done only be uninvolved administrators, within reason.
• Protection should be for the shortest necessary duration.