Countervandalism Network/Cloaks

Countervandalism network
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The countervandalism network
is a distinct group. It is neither
affiliated with nor managed by the
Wikimedia Foundation.

On IRC, a hostname cloak replaces the display of your IP address or IP hostname with a cloak. These hostnames are typically displayed in join/part/quit messages, and in the output of "WHO" or "WHOIS" commands.

For example, jvol@100.40.60.89 could become jvol@countervandalism/Alexander-Sigachov.

Purposes of a cloak

People typically use cloaks in order to hide their IP (which can be considered sensitive and private), to promote their activity with a project, or to prove their on-wiki identity. Note: A cloak will not securely hide your IP completely. There are ways around it. If you are concerned about exposing your real IP address, use Tor or a VPN.

Gaining a cloak

The simplest way to get a cloak is to use the self-service bot in the #libera-cloak channel (see instructions). This will instantly give you a generic @user/irc-username cloak. There are also @wikimedia, @wikipedia and other cloaks available via IRC/Cloaks.

To get a @countervandalism cloak, follow the below request process.

Requests

Cloaks can now be requested here. If you do not have an IRC account with Libera Chat, you must set one up first.

Countervandalism cloaks are temporarily unavailable. Ask in #countervandalism for more information.