Wikipedia:There is no credential policy

For the use of credentials in biographical articles, see Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biographies § Academic titles.

"WP:Authority" redirects here. For information about authority control in Wikipedia, see Wikipedia:Authority control.

Wikipedia currently has no policy with regard to the accuracy, validity, or proper verification of academic or professional credentials of our editors. Proposals to verify as well as to reject them have both been considered and have been decided against. In the absence of an official policy, editors are free to make claims regarding their own credentials as they see fit, but there is no official requirement for any other editors to treat credentials in the same manner.

Any information about credentials that is displayed on our user pages (for example, in a userbox) has been placed there by its author, as Wikipedia does not have procedures for verifying it. Editors may interpret existing Wikipedia policy as supporting a certain credential policy, but such interpretations may not necessarily be shared by the community and do not necessarily reflect official policy.

Rejected proposals

The following proposals to verify credentials were rejected:

• Wikipedia:Credentials (proposal)
• Wikipedia:Credential verification (proposal)
• User:Jimbo Wales/Credential Verification

The following proposals to disallow credentials were rejected:

• Wikipedia:Credential ban
• Wikipedia:Ignore all credentials

Other related proposals

• User:Avraham/Wiki of Trust – an essay that contains a proposal for a trust/verification system
• Wikipedia:Administrators accountability – rejected proposal for two levels of editors and two levels of administrators, with the higher level of admins required to disclose their real name

Related projects in sister projects

• de:Wikipedia:Persönliche Bekanntschaften A project where Wikipedians testify that they have met the owner of a particular account in person (designed mainly to mitigate the effects of malicious sockpuppetry, it does not verify real names or credentials)

Essays

On credentials:

• Wikipedia:Credentials matter
• Wikipedia:Credentials are irrelevant
• User:Misza13/Nobody cares about your credentials
• User:Bcasterline/Credentials are harmless

On related subjects:

• Wikipedia:Honesty

See also

• Essjay controversy
• Wikipedia: Expert retention
• Wikipedia: Expert rebellion
• The Wikimedia Foundation's Access to nonpublic data policy, which requires volunteers who have access to nonpublic data covered by the privacy policy (such as stewards, checkusers and oversights) to make their identity known to the foundation