I have been blocked from editing

The main article on this is Wikipedia:Appealing a block.

Special information for British users

Most Internet service providers in the United Kingdom implement a filtering system that excludes content that the Internet Watch Foundation thinks is inappropriate for you to see. This system works by routing communications between you and Wikipedia through a so-called proxy server.

From Wikipedia's point of view, all communications from these providers seem to come from only a few computers (the proxy servers). This makes it almost impossible for Wikipedia to distinguish between users, including between "good" users and users who abuse the Wikipedia system. This means that it may be impossible to edit Wikipedia from where you are.

We cannot fix these problems without the active collaboration of British Internet service providers.

The only workaround is for your Internet service provider to implement a technique known as X-Forwarded-For and to email Wikipedia (info-en-t@wikimedia.org) about it, quoting the exact IP addresses of their outgoing proxy servers. We suggest you contact their technical support and ask them to do so. Please also email us in order to keep us updated.

In some cases, entire networks are prevented not only from editing Wikipedia, but also from accessing it altogether. This is not a problem on our side — we never block people from reading the site (unless they launch a denial of service hacking attack on our systems). This is a problem caused by misconfiguration in your Internet service provider or its upstream provider, due to the filtering system described above. Again, please contact your provider's technical support and tell them to look for problems in their BGP/routing tables. Please also email us in order to keep us updated.

Further information

You can wait until the block expires.

Now might be a good time to take a break from Wikipedia and do something else; for example, go to the library.

Contact the blocking administrator, and/or appeal

If you believe you were wrongly blocked and want to do something about it right now, you have two main routes:

• Your first step should be to contact the blocking admin, especially if you believe that the block was due to a mistake or misunderstanding. Go to the user page for the admin you need to contact, and choose "Email this user" from the toolbox on the left-hand side of the page.

• Separately, you may seek independent review of the block from another, uninvolved administrator, by appealing the block if you believe the block is unfair.

If you are editing from a school, the school administration may be able to help.

Some blocks affect everyone who is editing from an entire school. School administrators are frequently able to deal with inappropriate use of Wikipedia through enforcement of existing school policies. Once this is done, a school-wide block can be removed upon request from the school administration (if it has not expired on its own).