Moderation Actions and Appeals Process

Here you will find everything you need to know about what to do if you’ve been moderated, including:

• The specific actions we take and what they mean or imply
• How to appeal and how we work around limitations with the appeal process
• Expectations on disclosures to third parties

First things first

We acknowledge that being moderated can be stressful. We do our best to intervene only when necessary and in the interest of preserving Hachyderm as a safe space. We acknowledge that we are human and that we can make errors. We ask for your patience and understanding that when we approach a situation, we are doing so as strangers moderating strangers.

For more information about what goes into how we interpret and enforce our rules, please take a look at our Moderator Covenant and Rule Explainer. Some of the language used below will come from the Moderator Covenant in particular.

Overview

• The moderation actions and information about them
  • Warn
  • Freeze and Suspend
  • Limit and Delete Post
• Reminder: not all moderation action is visible
• The Appeals Process
  • When not to appeal
  • When to appeal
  • Limitations of the appeals process
• When Someone You Know Has Been Moderated

The moderation actions and information about them

Although there are a few actions we can take as moderators, the most common are:

• Warn
• Freeze
• Suspend

Two additional, less commonly used, actions are:

• Limit
• Delete Posts

Warn

The warning feature is a tool in the Mastodon admin tools that allows us to send a message directly to you.

When you receive a warning, that means that the moderation team has decided:

• The impact of what you were reported for did not require a more significant intervention, and …
• …based on the interaction(s), we believe that you will respond to the warning with a growth mindset.

Essentially, warnings are the feature that allow us to respond to a report with a gentle nudge in the right direction. Warnings do not change your login, use, or ability to federate as a Hachyderm user.

It is important to understand that, unlike some other systems, a “warning” is not something that is tracked for later punishment. This means that you are not accruing “strikes”, or similar, with every warning you receive. That said, please do keep in mind that we choose our actions to prevent recurrence of the same actions that have caused the community harm. So while there is not a strike system, this is not leeway to continue to do what you were reported for without change.

When the moderation team sends a warning, we always send a message with what we need from you. This may be a reminder to leave interactions that are not going how you hope or intend, or it may be a reminder to disengage if you’ve been asked to leave a conversation for whatever reason.

Freeze and Suspend

These are both actions that prevent you from using your Hachyderm account normally.

• Freeze
  You will be able to log in, but will only be able to access your account settings with a message that your account is still otherwise online. Basically this means that to an outside observer your account is still “up”.
• Suspend
  When your account is suspended it will be taken offline. Your data including media, posts, followers, and following will all be intact for 30 days. After 30 days, they are automatically purged from the server after that time.

In all except the most egregious situations, whether a moderator suspends or freezes an account is based on what we are seeing in the reported interaction. Specifically:

• How severe is the impact of the reported interaction to our community and other communities
• Is the situation continuing to escalate, or at risk of doing so
  • Which action, freeze or suspend, reduces the risk to our community and others

If your account was frozen, you should always file an appeal. If your account was suspended, the situation of the suspension will determine if an appeal is possible. (Skip to The Appeals Process)

We want to call out that there are times that we temporarily suspend an account even if the rule broken is not severe. This would only happen when there is an impact to the server or community that would warrant and benefit from an immediate, visible, action and forced cool-down period.

Limit and Delete Post

Being limited means that you are hidden on our instance. Your posts are all still visible to your followers and can still be discovered when directly searched for. Your posts will not otherwise show up in the Local feed. You will be able to federate with other instances normally.

Delete Post is what it sounds like - we can delete the reported posts and associated media (if that media is uploaded to Hachyderm).

We do not typically Limit accounts or Delete Posts. We have a couple of reasons for this:

• We do not want the moderation process to be passive; essentially, if you acted in a way that required intervention, we want to see that you are willing and able to rectify the situation without further intervention.
• In the case of Limit in particular, we do not want the process to go on without resolution.

This means that, in general, we will use one of the other actions and communicate what we’d need from you in an appeal process to reinstate normal functioning of your account.

Reminder: not all moderation action is visible

Of the above actions, the only moderation actions that are visible are if a moderator deletes a post or suspends an account. When an issue is closed without action or when a user is warned, frozen, or limited, the action is not visible to the reporting user or other users.

Moderation Privacy

We do not moderate in public. This is a safety decision.

When someone is moderated on Hachyderm, we can confirm that a moderation action was taken and what type of action it was (warn, freeze, suspend, etc.). What we will not do is disclose the reasons behind that action if doing so could compromise the safety of another person. Moderation situations frequently involve more than one party, and the details of why someone was moderated can make it possible to identify, locate, or target someone else in the situation. For example, if a man harasses a woman and we publicly reference the specifics of that situation, the woman is placed at risk of further harassment, whether she was the one who reported it or not.

We will disclose the details of a moderation action to the moderated person themselves, through direct communication (email or appeal). We will share the details of a moderation action with third parties only when we have the informed consent of all parties involved, not only the person who was moderated.

It is also important to understand the notification limitations of the platform. Mastodon can only notify local Hachyderm users when a moderation action has been taken on their specific account. Users who filed a report do not receive in-platform notifications about the outcome, regardless of whether the report was about a local or remote user. Remote users are also not notified through the platform when an action is taken that affects them.

In those cases, we may reach out to the remote user directly if there is a public contact method available and if doing so does not put another party at risk. We may also contact their instance’s moderation team. Both of these are manual processes that happen outside the platform itself.

The Appeals Process

You may respond to any moderator action with an appeal. In all cases except for 1 ) severe rule violations or 2 ) creating a banned account type it is in your interest to file an appeal to start or continue a conversation about what you reported for.

When not to appeal

The only two situations when filing an appeal will not be helpful. If the harm done to the community is repetitive (before it was caught) and the impact and risk to the community is high, there is no benefit to you filing an appeal. This includes, but is not limited to, being in favor of systems of oppression, posting illegal content, harassment, etc.

The other situation is if the account is a type that we ban on our server and it was correctly flagged (please file an appeal if not). Common types of banned accounts are those that don’t abide by our NSFW Policy and Monetary Policy.

For clarity: if your account was suspended (or frozen) due to being either 1 ) an unrecognized special account type or 2 ) not following the rules for your account type (bots, companies, etc.) then you should file an appeal.

When to appeal

If the reason that your account was flagged for a rules violation was incorrect, you should file an appeal. We again ask for patience and understanding as we work with you to correct our mistake in that case.

Some cases for something like this:

• An account that is flagged as a company or business (a corporate account), but is not.
• An account that is a specialized account type, but one that is not directly allowed from our Account Types. Currently, accounts that are not specifically called out are not allowed. We request and recommend everyone interested in creating accounts that are in a grey area to reach out to us at admin@hachyderm.io.

There are other cases where we use freeze and suspend as tools to help de-escalate or otherwise resolve a situation in progress, but the freeze or suspension does not need to be permanent. Example situations for this:

• A specialized account type not following the rules for that account type. (e.g. bot posting more than the limit, not using hashtags, etc.)
• If a situation is escalating in a way that cannot be resolved without stopping what is happening while in progress. (e.g. A user accidentally spamming the server due to something misconfigured.)

Where possible and applicable, we try to include whatever needs to happen to unfreeze or unsuspend an account. Commonly, with frozen accounts, we may need you to agree to delete posts or similar to re-instate your account.

Whenever you file an appeal you should always email us due to limitations in the appeals process. (See next section.)

Limitations of the appeals process

Whenever you want to file an appeal you should both file the appeal and email us at admin@hachyderm.io.

The reason for this is that the Appeal feature in the admin interface does not allow us to continue a conversation with you. When we receive an appeal we can only Approve or Reject. We cannot send an outbound communication when we do either action and cannot send a communication to help us decide what action to take.

In order for us to know if your account was flagged incorrectly and why, or for us to be able to reinstate your account if it was frozen or suspended pending action we requested of you, we will need you to email us at admin@hachyderm.io. Please also include a summary of the situation in the appeal itself, as that will remain tied with the appeal in admin UI, which will set the initial context and set the expectation that there are emails corresponding to the appeal.

What Does a Successful Appeal Look Like?

All moderation decisions are made with the understanding that something has happened that required intervention. Resolving that intervention through an appeal is, in most cases, straightforward.

If we made an error, your appeal can be as simple as letting us know. Point us to the interaction we may have misread, or share any context we may not have had at the time of the decision. We review that information and correct course where appropriate.

If the moderation action was in response to something that did happen, the path back is also straightforward. For Hachyderm users, this commonly follows our freeze pattern: we provide a short article or similar resource (typically under five minutes of reading) related to the situation, even if it does not describe the exact circumstances. The appeal in that case is as simple as reading what we sent, confirming that you have read and understood it, and letting us know. We do not ask for lengthy actions as part of the path back to community.

If you are a remote user and are unsure whether you have been moderated or what steps to take, emailing us to ask is enough to start the conversation. We will let you know what, if anything, is needed.

The appeals process is designed to be accessible and low-friction. You do not need to build a case or recruit support. You just need to reach out.

Timeliness of Appeals

We encourage anyone who wishes to appeal a moderation decision to do so as soon as they are able.

Moderation decisions are made based on the full context available at the time, including posts, threads, and interactions across accounts. Over time, that context can change. Posts may be deleted. Accounts may migrate or be removed. Threads may become incomplete as other participants change or remove their own contributions. The further from the original decision an appeal is filed, the less complete the available record may be.

We may not be able to meaningfully revisit a decision when the evidence that informed it is no longer available for review. This is not a penalty for delay. It is a practical reality: we cannot responsibly re-evaluate a situation on an incomplete evidence base, and we will not guess at context we can no longer verify.

If you have been moderated and are considering an appeal, the best thing you can do is reach out to us at admin@hachyderm.io while the full context of the situation is still available.

Appeals for Remote Users

If you interact with Hachyderm from another Fediverse instance, the Mastodon appeal interface is not available to you. To appeal a moderation action that affects your ability to federate with us, email us at admin@hachyderm.io. As noted above, the platform cannot notify remote users when an action is taken, so if you believe you have been affected and have not heard from us, please reach out.

You are also welcome to ask your instance’s moderation team to contact us on your behalf. We routinely work with other instance moderators and are happy to have them act as an intermediary.

When you (or your moderators) email us, please include:

• Your full Fediverse handle (e.g. @you@your.instance)
• A summary of the situation as you understand it

We review remote appeals with the same care and standards that we apply to appeals from our own users.

When Someone You Know Has Been Moderated

If someone you follow or care about has been moderated, your instinct to help is understandable. We ask that you pause before acting on that instinct, because not all help is helpful and some interventions can make a situation worse for the person you are trying to support.

Before you reach out to us or take action on someone else’s behalf, please consider the following:

Does the person actually want intervention?

Sometimes people talk about being moderated because they need to vent or process. Venting is not always a call to action. It is sometimes a call for people to hold space. If someone has been moderated, whether they have chosen to appeal or not, they may neither need nor want you to do anything other than be present. So just be present.

Similarly, if the person has explicitly said they do not want to engage with the moderation team, respect that decision. Reaching out to us on their behalf, against their stated wishes, is not advocacy. It is overriding their autonomy in a situation where they have already made a choice about how they want to handle it.

If the person does want help, what kind of help do they want?

The most helpful thing you can do is ask them what kind of help they actually want or need. Do they need help drafting communication? Do they want someone to review their appeal before they send it? Would it help for you to read through the correspondence so far to offer more holistic feedback? Do they need something else entirely? The most useful thing you can do is ask, and then do the thing they asked for.

Is the person someone who might need proactive support?

If the person is a member of a marginalized community, new to the industry, or otherwise in a situation where they may not feel empowered to advocate for themselves, your proactive support may genuinely be welcome. Use your judgment, but lead with a question rather than an assumption about what they need.

What we will and will not do when you contact us on someone else’s behalf

We will confirm whether or not a moderation action was taken and what type of action it was. We will not share the details of the situation with you unless we have the consent of all parties involved, not only the person who was moderated. This is the same standard we would apply to protect you if you were the other party in a moderation situation.

If you believe we have made an error, the most effective thing you can do is help the moderated person file their own appeal and email us at admin@hachyderm.io. If the moderated person is on another instance, their moderator or moderation team is also welcome to reach out to us on their behalf. Moderator-to-moderator communication is a normal and expected part of how the Fediverse works. We take every appeal seriously.

Do you want to understand the full situation?

The moderated person has the most complete picture of their own situation. They have access to any correspondence they have sent to us or received from us, and they can share that with you at their discretion. If the confirmation we are able to provide (whether an action was taken and what type) is not sufficient for you, the person you care about is the best source of additional context.

A note on public advocacy

Public pressure campaigns do not change the outcome of a moderation decision. The only way to change a moderation outcome is for the moderated person to file an appeal. Others cannot change the decision on their behalf, regardless of the method.

What public campaigns do affect is the safety of other people involved in the situation. Moderation situations frequently involve more than one person, and public attention can expose people who did not ask for that exposure, including the moderated person themselves. If you want to help, help the person that wishes to appeal to email us - and only to the degree they wish.