Hi!
We are currently working on improvements to Mastodon moderation, and one feature we’re working on is the ability to appeal moderation actions, with the possibility for them to be overruled.
But we do have an issue with post deletion, where currently, post deletion is irrevocable, as a Delete
permanently invalidates a post identifier in Mastodon, to address two different concerns:
- out-of-order messages (
Delete
thenCreate
received out of order because of network issues, relayed messages, etc.) - malicious replay of a
Create
activity for content that has been deleted by its author (since we use Linked-Data Signatures, theCreate
could possibly be replayed)
I’m not sure how we could handle that situation better, but we probably need some protocol change here. One idea would be to use an activity of the form
{
"type": "Undo",
"object": {
"type": "Delete",
"object": {
"type": "Note",
…
},
},
},
}
It would still be possible to replay the Undo
if for some reason the post was deleted, un-deleted and re-deleted again, but that case seem much rarer than the previous case.
Feedback is welcome, as, however rare that situation (a moderator deleting the post and then the decision being overruled), it would be damageable if different parts of the fediverse disagreed on whether the post has been permanently deleted.