UESPWiki:Protection Policy

The protection policy describes how a small handful of articles may be protected.

Protection is a technical ability on the wiki given to administrators (and, in the case of section protection, to patrollers) that prevents editors from editing a page.  Protection is used as a last resort, and several different levels of protection are available so that the minimum necessary level of protection can be implemented:
Full protection: only administrators can edit or move the article.  Listed at :Category:Full Protection.
Semi-protection: autoconfirmed users can edit or move the article; new accounts and anonymous editors cannot edit the article. Listed at :Category:Semi Protection.
Move protection: anyone can edit the article, but it can only be moved (renamed) by administrators.  Listed at :Category:Move Protection.
Section protection: a specific section of an article can be protected using   tags, in which case only patrollers and administrators can edit that section of the article.  Only patrollers and administrators are allowed to add or delete protect tags.  Listed at :Category:Section Protection.

Why Protect Pages?
In general, page protection is implemented either to prevent changes to critical parts of the site or as a last resort to prevent undesirable edits.  Usually, protection is only applied to articles, not talk pages.  This ensures that all members of the community can still make suggestions about necessary changes to the article, by posting those suggestions on the talk page.  The primary exception to this rule is vandalized user talk pages, in which case sections of the talk page may be protected, as detailed below.

Specific reasons why articles are protected are listed below:

Full Protection
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Protecting pages with very high visibility, such as the :Main Page and site logo, from being vandalized.
Protecting pages with a high sensitivity, such as Copyright and Ownership or the site's financial records.
For maintaining the integrity of copyright pages for legal reasons.
In addition to being blocked, talk pages of users can be protected if abused by the blocked users, but only if the abuse continues despite the implementation of section protection.
Protecting very high-use templates that are unlikely to be edited.
Spam-blocking: spam-bots may create pages in unusual locations that do not correspond to the normal page-naming system.  As spam, they are always speedy deleted, but persistent spam-bots will continually recreate them after they are deleted.  To prevent this, an Administrator might create a place-holder page in its place and protect it to prevent it being used again by spammers.  Since these pages are created with non-standard names, there is no legitimate reason to edit them.  Thanks to improved spam protection measures, new spam-blocking pages are rarely needed, but most of the existing spam-blockers have been left in place.

Semi-Protection
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To protect pages that have been frequently vandalized.
To protect high-visibility pages, like those linked to from the sidebar.
As a temporary measure to defuse an edit war, after repeated attempts to discuss the edits have failed.  In such a case, the protection should be lifted as soon as possible, for example as soon as the editors have all contributed to the talk page discussion.
To protect archived discussions from being edited for any reason besides maintenance once a discussion is archived.
To protect high-use templates, avoiding massive site disruption as the result of a single edit.

Move Protection
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Pages are protected against moves when they are linked to from the site's left-hand menu or some other prominent part of the site interface.

Creation Protection
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Pages that are frequently created as spam will typically be salted (the act of the creation protection) in order to prevent more spam. Such pages are listed at .

Section Protection
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Section protection has been added to the site to prevent users from tampering with warnings and other official messages placed on user talk pages.  Initially, warnings and messages added to user talk pages are not protected.  However, if an editor alters any official message, the changes should be reverted and all official messages on that page should be protected.  Preemptive section protection is acceptable for sockpuppet accounts of editors who have previously altered official messages.  See Blocking Policy for additional information.
When adding section protection, be sure to add the category link ( ) inside the protect tags so that the category is also protected.
At the current time, protection of official messages on user talk pages is the only acceptable use of section protection.  Section protection is more problematic than other means of protection.  Therefore any other proposed use of section protection must be discussed by the community prior to implementation.
Attempts by editors other than administrators and patrollers to use protect tags or tamper with protect tags will result in a warning and, if necessary, more extreme measures such as blocking and full protection of the targeted user talk page.

Other Protection Types
It is possible to semi-protect a page from editing and to protect a page from being moved at the same time, which is likely to happen if an article needs to be protected from editing for one reason and moving for another. Another possibility is to protect a page from editing but not from moves. There may be possibilities in the future where this may be recommended, but in almost all cases if a page is protected from editing, it is likely to be protected from being moved as well. All pages are protected from being moved by anonymous editors, so semi-protecting a page against moves will do nothing.

A different kind of protection done at higher levels is called a database lock. This procedure can only be done by Dave Humphrey, and it will effectively prevent anything from being manipulated, regardless of user level, until the database lock has been undone. This is only done when editing the wiki could be harmful, such as when the wiki is being upgraded.

List of Protected Pages
All protected pages (other than Mediawiki pages, all of which are fully protected) should be listed in one of the subcategories under :Category:Protected Pages. In addition to that and the action summary given during the protection, it may help to further discuss the protection either on the article's talk page or on the administrator noticeboard.

Temporary Namespace Protection
There are times when a new namespace is required; usually the release of a new game, or an expansion for a game. Once that game or expansion is released two levels of namespace protection will be implemented (neither of which applies to talkpages):
# Page creation in the new namespace will be limited once bots have the information to start working.
# Page creation in Lore, Main, and the most recent gamespace will be limited immediately.

The first policy will be implemented for a period of two months (one month in the case of game expansion namespaces), so long as there are active bots; the second will be implemented for two months regardless of either clause. Careful discretion may also be used by Administrators to add Full or Semi Protection to Lore articles highly affected by new games or DLC. Anyone with the "tboverride" (UserPatrollers, Autopatrolled Users, Patrollers, and Administrators) is not prevented from adding pages (in case anything was missed, or two or more items use the same name). Other users should use the New Page Requests page.

Administrators implementing this policy should add the appropriate lines here, and modify the text here.

See Also
 – A description of what an administrator is.
:Category:Protected Pages – A list of protected pages on the wiki, sorted by level of protection.