This page documents an English Wikipedia policy, a widely accepted standard that all editors should normally follow. Changes made to it should reflect consensus. Shortcuts:
WP:PP
WP:PROTECT
This page in a nutshell: Editing or moving of a page can be restricted by administrators. As Wikipedia is built around the principle that anyone can edit it, this should only be done in certain situations.

Administrators are able to protect a page to restrict editing or moving of that page, and remove such protection. Protection can be indefinite, or expire after a specified time.

• Full protection prevents editing by everyone except administrators. Fully protected media files cannot be overwritten by new uploads.
• Semi-protection prevents editing by unregistered contributions and contributors with accounts which are not autoconfirmed.
• Creation protection prevents a page (normally a previously deleted one) from being recreated. (also known as "salting").
• Move protection protects the page solely from moves.
• Upload protection protects the file from reupload, does not protect the file page from editing.

Any type of protection or unprotection may be requested at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection. Changes to a protected page should be proposed on the corresponding talk page, and carried out if they are uncontroversial or if there is consensus for them.

Except in the case of office actions (see below), administrators may unprotect a page if the reason for its protection no longer applies, a reasonable period has elapsed, and there is no consensus that continued protection is necessary. Contacting the administrator who originally protected the page is advised in unclear circumstances. A log of protections and unprotections is available at Special:Log/protect.

Types of protection

Full protection

Policy shortcuts:
WP:FULL
WP:GOLDLOCK

A fully protected page can be edited only by administrators. The protection may be for a specified time, such as 7 or 14 days, or may be indefinite. The edit tab for a protected page is replaced by a "view source" tab, where users can view and copy, but not edit, the wikitext of that page. Administrators still have an edit tab, but the edit box is with a warning above it.

Any modification to a fully protected page should be proposed on its talk page (or in another appropriate forum). After consensus has been established for the change, or if the change is uncontroversial, any administrator may make the necessary edits to the protected page. To draw administrators' attention to a request for an edit to a protected page, place the {{editprotected}} template on the talk page.

All requests are submitted at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection.

Content disputes

On pages that are experiencing edit warring, temporary full protection can force the parties to discuss their edits on the talk page, where they can reach consensus. Isolated incidents of edit warring, and persistent edit warring by particular users, may be better addressed by blocking, so as not to prevent normal editing of the page by others.

The Five Pillars
Enforcement policies
Administrators
Banning policy
Blocking policy
Bot policy
Harassment
Protection policy
Sock puppetry
Username policy
Vandalism
Policy shortcut:
WP:PREFER

When protecting a page because of a content dispute, administrators normally protect the current version, except where the current version contains content that clearly violates content policies, such as vandalism, copyright violations, or defamation of living persons. Since protecting the most current version sometimes rewards edit warring by establishing a contentious revision, administrators may also revert to an old version of the page predating the edit war if such a clear point exists. Pages that are protected because of content disputes should not be edited except to make changes which are uncontroversial or for which there is clear consensus (see above).

Administrators should not protect or unprotect a page to further their own position in a content dispute.

Vandalism

Policy shortcut:
WP:NO-PREEMPT

Pre-emptive full protection of articles is contrary to the open nature of Wikipedia. Brief periods of full protection are used in rare cases when a large number of autoconfirmed accounts are used to make a sustained vandalism attack on an article. Persistent vandalism, or the possibility of future vandalism for highly trafficked articles, rarely provides a basis for full-protection. Semi-protection is used for articles, such as Jesus, that have a pattern of heavy sustained vandalism.

"History only" review

If a deleted page is undergoing deletion review, only administrators are normally capable of viewing the former content of the page. If they feel it would benefit the discussion to allow other users to view the page content, administrators may restore the page, blank it or replace the contents with {{TempUndelete}} or a similar notice, and fully protect the page to prevent further editing. The previous contents of the page are then accessible to non-admins via the page history.

Office actions

Policy shortcut:
WP:BLACKLOCK

As outlined at Wikipedia:Office actions, pages may be protected by Wikimedia Foundation staff in response to issues such as copyright or libel. Such actions override community consensus. Administrators should not edit or unprotect such pages without permission from Wikimedia Foundation staff. A list of pages under the scrutiny of the Wikimedia Foundation can be found here.

Semi-protection

Policy shortcut:
WP:SILVERLOCK

Semi-protection prevents edits from anonymous users (IP addresses), as well as edits from any account that is not autoconfirmed (is at least four days old and has ten or more edits to Wikipedia) or confirmed. Such users can request edits to a semi-protected page by proposing them on its talk page, using the {{editsemiprotected}} template if necessary to gain attention. They may also request the confirmed userright by visiting Requests for permissions.

Administrators may apply indefinite semi-protection to pages which are subject to heavy and persistent vandalism or violations of content policy (such as biographies of living persons, neutral point of view). Semi-protection should not be used as a pre-emptive measure against vandalism that has not yet occurred, nor should it be used solely to prevent editing by anonymous and newly registered users.

In addition, administrators may apply temporary semi-protection on pages that are:

• Subject to significant but temporary vandalism or disruption (for example, due to media attention) when blocking individual users is not a feasible option.
• Subject to edit-warring where all parties involved are anonymous or new editors (i.e., in cases in which full-protection would otherwise be applied). This does not apply when autoconfirmed users are involved.
• Article discussion pages, when they have been subject to persistent disruption. Such protection should be used sparingly because it prevents anonymous and newly registered users from participating in discussions. A page and its talk page should not both be protected at the same time.
• Talk pages of blocked IP addresses that are being used for continued inappropriate editing, including repeated abuse of the {{unblock}} template, or continued uncivil or offensive remarks. The protection should be timed so as to not exceed the length of the block. Although administrators may also choose to change the block settings to block the user from editing their talk page instead, since there is no need to synchronize the block period with the page protection time period with this method.

Today's featured article is semi-protected only in the most serious cases, despite the increased vandalism that results from its presence on the Main Page. For guidelines on protecting articles linked from the main page, see Wikipedia:Main Page featured article protection.

Permanent protection

Policy shortcuts:
WP:PPINDEF
WP:REDLOCK

Some areas of Wikipedia are permanently protected by the MediaWiki software. The MediaWiki namespace, which defines parts of the site interface, is fully protected; administrators cannot remove this protection. In addition, user CSS and JavaScript pages, such as User:Example/monobook.css and User:Example/cologneblue.js, are automatically fully protected. Only accounts that are associated with these pages or administrators are able to edit them. This protection applies to any user subpage with a ".css" or ".js" extension, whether an equivalent MediaWiki skin exists or not. Administrators may modify these pages, for example, to remove a user script that has been used in an inappropriate way.

In addition to the hard-coded protection, the following are usually permanently protected:

• Pages that are very visible, such as the Main Page or File:Wiki.png.
• Pages that should not be modified for copyright or legal reasons, such as the general disclaimer or the local copy of the site copyright license.
• Pages that are very frequently transcluded, such as {{tl}} or {{ambox}}, to prevent vandalism or denial of service attacks. This includes images or templates used in other highly visible or frequently transcluded pages. See Wikipedia:High-risk templates for more information.

Creation protection

Policy shortcuts:
WP:SALT
WP:PDP
WP:BLUELOCK