The CARIAD Domain Observatory Web service (cariad.fedicheck.iftas.org) is being shut down. To ensure server administrators and moderation teams can retain access to reliable, consensus-driven moderation data, IFTAS is transitioning to a suite of downloadable and subscribable denylist files.

IFTAS is providing direct access to these lists in our Community Library: https://about.iftas.org/library/denylist-resources/#IFTAS_Domain_Denylist_Resources

Moving forward, you can select from tiered consensus levels based on observed blocking activity across the network, alongside the human-curated lists maintained by IFTAS:

• CARIAD Consensus Tiers: Available in 51%, 66%, and 80% agreement thresholds.
• Do Not Interact (DNI) List: Our human-reviewed list of high-risk domains strongly recommended for defederation.
• Abandoned & Unmanaged Domains (AUD) List: Curated list targeting dedicated spam services and unmoderated/abandoned instances.
• (New) Omnibus File: A single, comprehensive file that combines the 51% Consensus Tier, AUD, and DNI lists into one stream.

If you currently rely on automated scripts or tools pulling from cariad.fedicheck.iftas.org, please update your endpoints to point to the new resource files linked above. We don’t have a hard date for shutdown, but it will likely be by end of September 2026. To be clear, it is broken, you should stop using it as soon as you read this.

The Denylist Ecosystem

We want to acknowledge the broader community efforts pushing trust and safety forward:

• Emelia Smith’s FIRES for pioneering proactive moderation infrastructure,
• Oliphant’s Pelago service for continued leadership in federated denylist curation and accessibility,
• Denylist Maintainers who publish their lists in a wide range of formats,
• Platform Developers: We are deeply grateful for the ongoing work across various Fediverse platform teams to build native, automated, and streamlined methods for importing and managing trusted sources like IFTAS. Special shoutout to GoToSocial’s extremely well-thought-out implementation of automated list import, see https://docs.gotosocial.org/en/latest/admin/domain_permission_subscriptions/ for more.

Scalable Safety for an Expanding Fediverse

With the rapid explosion of new domains federating, the operational overhead for volunteer admins and moderation teams has scaled exponentially. Federating with a new domain means opening an untrusted door; doing so safely requires real-time insight, shared metadata, and reliable reputational signals that don’t rely on single points of failure.

We firmly believe that the future of the Social Web rests on consent-based federation, where server administrators and users retain explicit control over who they connect with, backed by actionable, transparent reputational data. IFTAS is working on reputation metrics/signals to help identify common markers when encountering a new domain. More to come, watch this space!

As the ecosystem matures, IFTAS remains committed to supporting sustainable moderation infrastructure, advancing shared signals, and empowering server operators with the tools needed to keep the Fediverse safe, resilient, and connected.

If you need assistance selecting the right tier or denylist for your server, reach out on network @iftas or email [email protected]