User talk:The Squirrel Conspiracy

Archives —
SM: 2010 · 2011: Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 · 2012: Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 · 2013: Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 · 2014: Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 · 2015+
SQ: 2015 to 2019 · 2020: Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 · 2021 to 2022 · 2023 to 2025

Copying files from Commons to Wikipedia

After asking a question, Pppery pointed me to Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 217#Allow file movers to upload files locally that share a name with a file on Commons.
So you might be interested in User:Alexis Jazz/XwikiXfer as I had the same issue. — Alexis Jazz (talk or ping me) 16:28, 18 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! The Squirrel Conspiracy (talk) 16:52, 18 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"Kevin Martens" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Kevin Martens has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Anyone, including you, is welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2025 September 16 § Kevin Martens until a consensus is reached. Thepharoah17 (talk) 23:58, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Temporary account IP viewer granted

Hello, The Squirrel Conspiracy. Per your request, your account has been granted temporary-account-viewer rights. You are now able to reveal the IP addresses of individuals using temporary accounts that are not visible to the general public. This is very sensitive information that is only to be used to aid in anti-abuse workflows. Please take a moment to review Wikipedia:Temporary account IP viewer for more information on this user right. It is important to remember:

You must not share IP address data with someone who does not have the same access permissions unless disclosure is permissible as per guidelines listed at Foundation:Policy:Wikimedia Access to Temporary Account IP Addresses Policy.
Access must not be used for political control, to apply pressure on editors, or as a threat against another editor in a content dispute. There must be a valid reason to investigate a temporary user. Note that using multiple temporary accounts is not forbidden, so long as they are not used in violation of policies (for example, block or ban evasion).

It is also important to note that the following actions are logged for others to see:

When a user accepts the preference that enables or disables IP reveal for their account.
Revealing an IP address of a temporary account.
Listing the temporary accounts that are associated with one or more IP addresses (using the CIDR notation format).

Remember, even if a user is violating policy, avoid revealing personal information if possible. Use temporary account usernames rather than disclosing IP addresses directly, or give information such as same network/not same network or similar. If you do not want the user right anymore then please ask me or another administrator and it will be removed for you. You may also voluntarily give up access at any time by visiting Special:Preferences. Happy editing! — rsjaffe 🗣️ 08:46, 20 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! The Squirrel Conspiracy (talk) 09:25, 20 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Guide to temporary accounts

Hello, The Squirrel Conspiracy. This message is being sent to remind you of significant upcoming changes regarding logged-out editing.

Starting 4 November, logged-out editors will no longer have their IP address publicly displayed. Instead, they will have a temporary account (TA) associated with their edits. Users with some extended rights like administrators and CheckUsers, as well as users with the temporary account IP viewer (TAIV) user right will still be able to reveal temporary users' IP addresses and all contributions made by temporary accounts from a specific IP address or range.

How do temporary accounts work?

Editing from a temporary account

When a logged-out user completes an edit or a logged action for the first time, a cookie will be set in this user's browser and a temporary account tied with this cookie will be automatically created for them. This account's name will follow the pattern: ~2025-12345-67 (a tilde, year of creation, a number split into units of 5).
All subsequent actions by the temporary account user will be attributed to this username. The cookie will expire 90 days after its creation. As long as it exists, all edits made from this device will be attributed to this temporary account. It will be the same account even if the IP address changes, unless the user clears their cookies or uses a different device or web browser.
A record of the IP address used at the time of each edit will be stored for 90 days after the edit. Users with the temporary account IP viewer (TAIV) user right will be able to see the underlying IP addresses.
As a measure against vandalism, there are two limitations on the creation of temporary accounts:
- There has to be a minimum of 10 minutes between subsequent temporary account creations from the same IP (or /64 range in case of IPv6).
- There can be a maximum of 6 temporary accounts created from an IP (or /64 range) within a period of 24 hours.

Temporary account IP viewer user right

How to enable IP Reveal

Administrators may grant the temporary account IP viewer (TAIV) user right to non-administrators who meet the criteria for granting. Importantly, an editor must make an explicit request for the permission (e.g. at WP:PERM/TAIV)—administrators are not permitted to assign the right without a request.
Administrators will automatically be able to see temporary account IP information once they have accepted the Access to Temporary Account IP Addresses Policy via Special:Preferences or via the onboarding dialog which comes up after temporary accounts are deployed.

Impact for administrators

It will be possible to block many abusers by just blocking their temporary accounts. A blocked person won't be able to create new temporary accounts quickly if the admin selects the autoblock option.
It will still be possible to block an IP address or IP range.
Temporary accounts will not be retroactively applied to contributions made before the deployment. On Special:Contributions, you will be able to see existing IP user contributions, but not new contributions made by temporary accounts on that IP address. Instead, you should use Special:IPContributions for this (see a video about IPContributions in a gallery below).

Rules about IP information disclosure

Publicizing an IP address gained through TAIV access is generally not allowed (e.g. ~2025-12345-67 previously edited as 192.0.2.1 or ~2025-12345-67's IP address is 192.0.2.1).
Publicly linking a TA to another TA is allowed if "reasonably believed to be necessary". (e.g. ~2025-12345-67 and ~2025-12345-68 are likely the same person, so I am counting their reverts together toward 3RR, but not Hey ~2025-12345-68, you did some good editing as ~2025-12345-67)
See Wikipedia:Temporary account IP viewer § What can and can't be said for more detailed guidelines.

Useful tools for patrollers

It is possible to view if a user has opted-in to view temporary account IPs via the User Info card, available in Preferences → Appearance → Advanced options → Enable the user info card
- This feature also makes it possible for anyone to see the approximate count of temporary accounts active on the same IP address range.
Special:IPContributions allows viewing all edits and temporary accounts connected to a specific IP address or IP range.
Similarly, Special:GlobalContributions supports global search for a given temporary account's activity.
The auto-reveal feature (see video below) allows users with the right permissions to automatically reveal all IP addresses for a limited time window.

Videos

How to use Special:IPContributions
How automatic IP reveal works
How to use IP Info
How to use User Info

Further information and discussion

For more information and discussion regarding this change, please see the announcement from the Wikimedia Foundation at Wikipedia:Village pump (WMF) § Temporary accounts rollout.

Most of this message was written by Mz7 (source). Thanks, 🎃 SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 02:47, 31 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]