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MSC1929 Homeserver Admin Contact and Support page

Currently, contacting a homeserver admin is difficult because you need to have insider knowledge of who the admin actually is. This proposal aims to fix that by specifying a way to add contact details of admins, as well as a link to a support page for users who are having issues with the service.

This proposal aims to fix https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/issues/484

Proposal

The proposal suggests adding a new endpoint: https://{hostname}/.well-known/matrix/support, where hostname is the server name, without the port number. This is the same as what is used when performing server discovery.

The response format should be:

{
    "contacts": [
        {
            "matrix_id": "@admin:domain.tld",
            "email_address": "[email protected]",
            "role": "m.role.admin"
        },
        {
            "email_address": "[email protected]",
            "role": "m.role.security"
        }
    ],
    "support_page": "https://domain.tld/support.html"
}

The contacts array is optional, but recommended.

The matrix_id and email_address do NOT need to have the same domain as the homeserver. It is expected that an admin will have a "backup" contact address if the server is down, like an email or alternative mxid on a different homeserver.

Entries may have a matrix_id OR an email_address, but at least one MUST be specified.

role is an informal description of what the address(es) are used for. The only two specified in this proposal are m.role.admin and m.role.security.

  • m.role.admin is a catch-all user for any queries.
  • m.role.security is intended for sensitive requests

Implementors may use custom values for role for other purposes, but it's suggested that the value be namespaced to prevent collisions. A value for role MUST be specified.

support_page is an optional property to specify a affiliated page of the homserver to give users help specific to the homeserver, like extra login/registration steps.

At least one valid key should be provided. This means contacts should have at least one entry, or the support_page should be defined. An empty object is not considered valid, however both contacts and support_page may be specified together.

Alternative solutions

Hardcode a given user localpart that should be used as an admin address.

  • The account would need to either internally redirect messages intended for @admin:domain.tld to another account(s)
  • OR require an admin to regularly sign into this special account to check for messages. Neither of which is useful.

Specify the same content inside a homeserver endpoint, rather than use .well-known.

  • This requires the homeserver to be up or responsive, which might be not very useful if trying to report issues with connectivity.

Use vCards.

  • vCards would add bloat, as the vast majority of a vcards contents is not useful for contacting an admin.

Security considerations

If the host is compromised, any information could be specified in the well known file which may direct users to send sensitive information to a malicious user.