Wikisource:News/2006-03-04/Developers enforce email confirmation

SpamCop, a free spam reporting service, recently blacklisted the Wikimedia Foundation's mailing servers for allegedly sending mail to spamtrap addresses. The service refuses to provide details per their internal policy. Brion (developer) has stated that, "I've disputed the listing, so hopefully we'll get it removed soonish and those who aren't getting email will, uh, start getting it again."

In the meantime, the developers have enabled email confirmation to prevent possible abuse of Wikimedia's user-to-user email service. It's hoped this will mitigate the possibility of abuse by forcing users to use a legitimate return address. Users who have set an email in their preferences should note that they cannot recieve or send email until they have confirmed the address. This applies to every wiki under the Wikimedia Foundation.

The pratice of requiring email confirmation is standard on the Internet. Without it, any user could theoretically use a fake email address and send out spam email that would be traced back to the Wikimedia Foundation. The confirmation method used is known as a "double opt-in" scheme, since a user must deliberately perform two actions: request an email, and confirm that they requested. This assures outside parties, like SpamCop, that all addresses it sends to are valid and willing.

How to confirm your email address
If you have specified an email address in your preferences, note that you cannot receive or send email until you've followed the steps below.


 * 1) While logged in, go to your preferences.
 * 2) At the bottom of the first tab, in the 'email' section, click Confirm your email address.
 * 3) Check your email. When you recieve the message from wiki@wikimedia.org (see below), click the confirmation link.
 * 4) Go back to your preferences.
 * 5) In the 'email' section, check the box beside "Enable e-mail from other users".
 * 6) Save.

This is an example of the confirmation email: Someone, probably you from IP address 127.0.0.1, has registered an

account "Username" with this e-mail address on Wikipedia.

To confirm that this account really does belong to you and activate

e-mail features on Wikipedia, please open this link in your browser:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Confirmemail/2894d39uhf3948f9thijgj4r586tjf40t8u4erj98

If this is *not* you, please do not follow the link. This confirmation code

will expire at 04:07, 9 March 2006.