Q&A for How to Close Your wikiHow Account

Staff can hide edit summaries. You can request this by emailing the Community Liaison with a valid reason.

This means that if the email address used for your wikiHow account (which is currently set in Settings) does not match with the email inputted in the form, the account will not be closed. It is a measure that prevents random people from getting others' accounts closed, as only you (and people with whom you have shared it) would know your email.

You cannot delete a wikiHow account, but you can anonymize its contributions.

The site's staff can hide a revision from public view if it contains private and/or personal information. To make such a request, you may reach out to the Community Manager directly with the relevant revision link and a valid reason (e.g. someone revealing their address).

Your email address is used to verify your identity when requesting to close an account. Staff often confirm with established users through their talk pages before making such a significant change. Providing your password would not be effective since websites hash passwords, and submitting it online is not advisable.

Staff will usually ask for confirmation through the concerned user's talk page. Closing an account is a substantial and irreversible action so there are extra measures to prevent someone else misusing the form.

No, only your username, email, and consent are required. Never give out your password online, as there are many scams.

Many generic Q&A icons are designed to be gender-neutral and include a mix of both masculine and feminine representations. Since the identities of the answerers are anonymous, the gender of the icons is not significant.

No, and the answerer's username will be removed from the answer.

If someone closes their account, their username will be removed from any contributions they made, and their profile picture will be replaced with a generic one, making it impossible to identify who answered the question.

There are far fewer established accounts compared to those without histories. Additionally, someone with a long history of editing might not want to close their account.

Any account that is made only to cause harm (make unconstructive edits) can be termed as an "evil" account. Such accounts go against the wikiHow:Mission and thus may be closed or blocked.

If someone else attempts to close your account without your consent, deny the request if the staff asks for confirmation. Keep your email private to prevent unauthorized use, and consider emailing the Community Liaison for additional support.

Closing an account is a substantial and irreversible action, while retiring allows you to stop contributing but return later if you choose. Retiring keeps your user and talk pages intact and does not change your username. It also does not involve any staff in the process.

A list of violations/prohibited usernames can be found at wikiHow:Username . Some basic violations include usernames that are misleading, nonsensical, offensive etc.

Hashing is preferred for storing passwords in modern websites' databases because it is a one-way process. This means the original password cannot be retrieved from its hash, making it harder to hack even if the database is compromised. Therefore, staff cannot match your password from the database, and it's not recommended to enter it in the form.

Closing an account involves deleting certain pages, a privilege granted to specific people. Without involving the administrative team, the closest you can get to closing your account yourself is by blanking your profile, user, and talk pages, then signing out and never returning.

Privileged users like New Article Boosters , Administrators etc. may create such accounts to test things from a user's Point of View who doesn't have any special permissions, unlike their main account. For example, staff may create a new account to test a newly released feature. Anyone may create a sockpuppet though, but all linked accounts may be blocked if misuse occurs.

Yes, you can use your email address again after deleting your account.

Taking a break from wikiHow then coming back later is called taking a wikiBreak. Add {{wikiBreak}} to your user page to let everyone know that you're taking one.

You can do either! If you want, you can let people know that you're taking a wikiBreak before you do it, but you don't have to.

Yes, staff will contact the user before deleting and the user has to confirm that they do want to close their account.

You cannot mass-delete random accounts, because a wikiHow staff member will message the account owner to confirm that the user requested the account deletion.

It's in the link in step 1 of this article. Click it and you will have two options: change your username or delete your account.

The account can't be logged into anymore and the talk page will be empty. The original username will be changed to something nondescript like "WikiHowUser" with the date and time of closure, but all the contributions (comments, edits, articles created) will stay attached to that name. If the user answered any questions in the Q&A section, the answerer's name will be blank and the photo will be a generic icon.

They do if the account is evil. Admins, Staff members, and a script account called StaffAction can close evil accounts.

They can see your email address when you provide it in the form.

You might delete your account if you no longer wish to contribute to wikiHow, as it's a permanent decision unlike retiring. Other reasons include not needing a test account or failing to sign the COPPA form if you were underage, which would result in account deletion after three days to protect your privacy.

No, you must delete the photo yourself or ask a staff member to do it for you.

Immediately rollback/undo the edit. To prevent someone from seeing the information through the edit history, ask an admin directly or post on wikiHow:Administrator-Notice-Board so that the revision can be hidden. If you feel comfortable, you may also warn the vandal, but it is usually best to not "feed the troll". (Also, an admin can do that for you.)