GitHub Community
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Hey,
The username Policy has not changed, it is still forbidden to squat a username :
The username I want had no activity since its creation (10 years), and last time he logged was 6 years ago. I don’t understand why my request is denied as the account violates the rules. |
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Replies: 62 comments 140 replies
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Hi @fudjia and welcome to the community. First of all, we cannot discuss account-specific matters on this forum. That’s what GitHub Support is for. Their answer seems clear to me:
The fact that name squatting is disallowed, does not change the fact that currently no new requests for the release of these names are being reviewed. A simple reason for this may be the following excerpt from the Username Policy, although that is just speculating from my side.
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Displaying contributions to private repositories on your profile page is optional. It can also be hidden from other users. |
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I have the same problem. I need a username, which is also my website (drblockchain.org), but it is owned by someone and never used. It has no history, no repository even though it was created 8 years ago. Probably the user has completely forgotten about it. Why can't I have it? 
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Same here, with my fully trademarked @autonomo... I'm forced to use @AutonomoDev. |
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I haven't trademarked anything but the username @tomatofu is taken by someone who doesn't seem to have any activity after they joined in 2018 :/ |
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I was able to attain this username in 2018, right after Github was acquired by Microsoft. |
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I’m a bit late to this thread, but I hope github reverses this policy. Without enforcement, name squatting is rather allowed.
This can’t really be the reason they declined to review the request. Without a review, github wouldn’t even know whether the account has non-public activity. If they simply wished to avoid the hassle of having to review for non-public activity, then they should just remove their stance against name-squatting. |
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@rcias @github can check the last logic date also. What if the user hasn't logged in for 4 - 5 years? |
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That alone isnt enough though, as someone could have made a repository that others use and then never logged on again, so the repo could be active but the person is not, so while yeah last login is definitely a piece of the puzzle I feel they also need to take other things into account. If there is a single repository that potentially should not be taken down. |
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You’re confusing a few things here. First of all, having a name-squatting ban in your ToS doesn’t actually mean you’re enforcing it. It just means it isn’t allowed, and serves as a good legal basis to remove accounts should they pose a problem. It doesn’t create an obligation to also actively enforce the rule. Furthermore, enforcing anti-name-squatting guidelines isn’t the same as allowing anyone to challenge the legitimacy of an account. GitHub may very well be enforcing this rule by, for example, automated checks on (private) account activity. This doesn’t really mean they have to allow anyone to challenge other accounts.
So this isn’t true, since by definition name-squatting is disallowed.
As I said; they may very well just run automated checks on account activity. User reporting and manual review isn’t the only way to check/enforce these things.
No, they don’t have to do anything. Name-squatting isn’t allowed, but it’s enforced without the help of user reports. Unfortunately those are the rules. If the name you desire is taken but there seems no public activity, I’m very sorry for you. GitHub won’t take review requests. And there is a good chance there still is private activity on the account. Try picking a different name and regularly check back on the other account: who knows some day might be your lucky day. |
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I actually laughed out loud. |
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Please, nobody is interested in such a lawyer-like statement. So many things are not allowed by definition within a society. We are not living in an ideal world, so the question is rather clear - what can you do about this? I got the standard reply given by OP just yesterday. |
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The Copilot would have a super easy time telling squatters from "edge cases" - Github could use their Copilot to automate the name-squatting release process. But if a process which requires minimal intellect cannot be handled by the company who owns the Copilot, what does that say about the Copilot and the company? |
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Why is this selected as an answer? The answer will be to review the policy instad of the need to buy a trademark for £200 and wait months just to get a name. |
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Hi, I saw that you managed to get the username you wanted. Would you mind telling me how you did it? |
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@johnsoncherian yes, though there may be a wait timer before you can. |
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But there's no way to find people with zero commit history and fake names, like the one I own the trademark for: @autonomo. No idea how to contact them. GitHub told me I have to wait an additional 18 months until the trademark is finalized. I've had the same problem with @phpexperts for 13 years. "PHP Experts" isn't a trademarkable name, as it's two descriptors. so I have to use the much worse @PHPExpertsInc. |
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crazy username |
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Hey, what does this mean? 😅 |
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What it means mr.? |
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Is there no recourse to try and get an inactive user removed anymore then? I had to do this twice for 2 orgs I am part of as they both had users who made an account and had no public activity since joining, I am in the same boat again where there is a user account which is squatting an org name I would like to use to split off some private repositories. It feels like removing this feature is a bad move, as you could still allow it but behind the scenes just have the support ticket check when the last user login/action and how many repositories they have interacted with, if they have not logged in for years and have never carried out any actions then take it through as a request for github to look, if not just have the ticket be binned so it doesnt waste peoples time with accounts that do things privately. As it currently stands there is a user who has no activity in over a decade other than making an account and I am powerless to request they be removed so I can make use of it. I implore github to rethink this. |
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You have to register a trademark and is a legal process to my knowledge, copyright is more likely but even then a copyright is not registered to then it becomes he said she said. I don't know why there can't be a section in report user for squatting. This way it isn't an explicit support ticket process but would allow the community to flag potentially inactive accounts and have an automated/manual process evaluate them at some point in time. Currently as mentioned there is no way to solve this problem, unless you want to enter into a potentially pseudo legal process i.e
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@grofit is it possible to takedown the inactive GitHub user with Trademark? |
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Anything is possible but I doubt github will take it further unless you can show legal documents pertaining to your ownership of the trademark, otherwise it is not legally enforceable and is a waste of their time. I feel the crux of this whole thing comes down to "github doesnt have time to deal with these requests" which is perfectly valid if we look at it the way it used to be done, so instead do as I mention in the other threads, make most of the process automated as they have the data to know if someone is actually using an account, its pretty clear if there is no repos and no activity after 5 years that the account is dormant, if they deleted it and the user decided "oh I really wanted that account" they could always go and recreate the account and MAYBE it would make them actually use it this time 😂 Another thing to think about is since MS has taken over, user data is potentially more valuable, so just having someone's email address on an active account gives them certain data about that user that they can legally use for analytics and marketing etc, so maybe its a case of they see even empty accounts as valuable these days. |
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The policy only allows for trademark requests where there is a violation. Simply having the org name This whole situation needs to change. |
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This problem is simple work for the Copilot. |
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They ghosted me essentially. I asked if a trademark would force them to uphold their squatting policy and they refused to answer.
Please excuse my brevity as this message was sent from my smartphone.
Spencer C. Imbleau (he/him/his)
… On Sep 9, 2022, at 19:03, Raj ***@***.***> wrote:
@simbleau what did GitHub reply when you tried with a trademark?
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@simbleau same here. GitHub ghosted me too when I asked about the trademark. |
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Yeah, damn Microsoft. Ruining GitHub. |
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I get the squatting thing...is it another thing if someone clearly argumented he has no interest in keeping the account, offered you to rename and free up the name already but keeps asking for "payment" to do so? Wonder if that's something I should open a ticket for and if Github still deals with that kind of stuff. |
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You could try to open a ticket but I don't see what the support could do. |
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I've run into a similar situation. What did you end up doing? Did support help in any way? |
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I think Github should start the name squatting policy again. |
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But there seems no way to let GitHub hear this kind of voice from the community. :| |
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Guy pay £200 for a trademark and hope they'll give it to you. Names now cost £200 to get on GitHub and take months. Because you need a trademark. Soon to create a repository you will need to register it with the gov and trademark the name. |
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I don't see why i can't dispute an username that has been dormant/inactive for 13 years. I hope they change the policy again. |
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We should all just register many many cool names... that way they'll need to think of some logical way to free names up |
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Its already like this jsmcm |
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I hate you Github. Bring back the policy |
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Microsoft* Corrected it for you. LinkedIn also sucks. |
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@github-staff This can't be the full story. I'm currently looking into the username "stryker" and the username was only registered in October 2022. There's no way this username wasn't in use before that so unless someone with the username personally signed on and deleted their account out of the goodness of their hearts, something must have happened to make this username available again. Side note, it seems the new user is squatting it, of course. |
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hope they bring back the username policy changes someday... 😤 |
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we are all waiting |
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I keep getting emails about this, if they haven't done it by now, they never will. I haven't signed in for months, this is a bad place to build a website. Then again, I lost mine and someone from one of the other forums grabbed it after I couldn't afford it. |
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Yeah this used to work earlier. If you raise a ticket, one of the staff members will look into the account and release it when it's obvious that the name was squatted. Now when you raise a ticket you'll be hit with "We can't release that username solely based on public activity report" this is weird. Surely they could've looked into the account's activity. At the least you'll be storing the last login date for accounts. |
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Good things take time. Remember where you're going to be 10years from now. We need to all stop using GitHub, this is the way to rebell! Its the exact same way to rebell against Copilot and their nonsense policy! Who's with me?! |
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Bro this days everyone is sleeping and the ***Microsoft and github give name to big companies or enterprises who pay dollars. |
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Move to Gitlab. :-) |
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Ironically my username is taken on gitlab, because I didn't care to register early enough. It looks like a legitimate account based on a real name, but my username is based on my real name too. |
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A better reason to not use Github is that it and copilot is ironically not open source. The git repo is portable but the Issues and Actions and etc systems aren't easily. |
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Because they don't care about users. GitHub is a joke.
On Tuesday, June 17, 2025 at 10:13:57 AM MDT, Dr. Armani ***@***.***> wrote:
I have the same problem. I need a username, which is also my website (drblockchain.org), but it is owned by someone and never used. It has no history, no repository even though it was created 8 years ago. Probably the user has completely forgotten about it. Why can't I have it?
Screenshot.2025-06-17.at.9.00.44.AM.png (view on web)
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GitHub...🤷🤦🖕🙅💩🤣
On Wednesday, June 18, 2025 at 04:48:44 AM MDT, z0roday ***@***.***> wrote:
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lol those are interesting emojs - you could add a tongue for a bigger effect as well |
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Reading this thread is kinda sad because it looks like I'm going to be stuck with the @administer-org name forever now because @administer is an obviously unused account which opened some issues on a blank repository ten years ago now. Sadly the Microsoft way of doing things seems to be just shutting down until enough people complain to invoke change. |
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I read an article about it some time ago, reached out myself... and nothing:(. Dreaded 'Unfortunately, we won't be able to release the username you requested. Please note, not all activity on GitHub is publicly visible; accounts with no visible activity may be in active use.', god damn it, it seems so clear that the account it abandoned? I wish I could get @friendlyone |
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In Dec 2018, right after Microsoft acquired GitHub, you were still able to get a manual name change by emailing support. It seems like all GitHub cares about now is their Copilot tool (and trying to monetize it once enough people are users), so all other community issues are ignored. |
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Yeah. I tried to claim my company username by providing the trademark as well but Github said that inactive username didn't violate the trademark. |
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same issue +1 |
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Hi GitHub Support, I’d like to request the release of the username "onuronon". I represent an active organization called "Onuronon" that is building open-source tools under this name. We would deeply appreciate it if you could review the inactivity and consider releasing the username for legitimate use. Best regards, |
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GitHub no longer issues usernames that have already been taken. Your Sincerity, |
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Not enough clout for github sorry |
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You need to throw some $$$$$$$$$ |
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This is fucking annoying tbh. |
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Classic Microslop ruining everything they touch! 🤡 |
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Hi GitHub Support, I know that you don't follow up on squatting policy but it does not mean that we, users, should not stop trying. I’d like to request the release of the username "atunko", so that I can register the organization atunko. Username: @atunko It appears to be a dormant placeholder account — created over 6 years ago, never used, with no profile information filled in. There is no public activity. There's no public way to identify who created it since they left all profile fields blank. We would deeply appreciate it if you could review the inactivity and consider releasing the username for legitimate use. Best regards, PS. @atunko If you can release the name so that I can use it as an organization for my open source tool (not public yet for this naming reason) then please contact me true social media or LinkedIn etc. Just google my name. Thank you. |
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Pack it in. |
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No idea what you mean by that. Please elaborate. |
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GitHub won't do it. |
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No, I was not holding breath. There is so many other things, even more important such as basic functionality, that Microsoft don't care to fix/improve. |
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Checkout this trademarks-and-domain-name-globally It explains how trademark ownership can be used to claim rights when a name is already registered or inactive. If you own a trademark matching the username you may have a stronger case when requesting GitHub to review the name under their trademark policy. |
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Having a trademark is not enough, read here: When we receive reports of trademark policy violations from holders of federal or international trademark registrations, we review the account and may take the following actions:
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and others
You’re confusing a few things here.
First of all, having a name-squatting ban in your ToS doesn’t actually mean you’re enforcing it. It just means it isn’t allowed, and serves as a good legal basis to remove accounts should they pose a problem. It doesn’t create an obligation to also actively enforce the rule.
Furthermore, enforcing anti-name-squatting guidelines isn’t the same as allowing anyone to challenge the legitimacy of an account. GitHub may very well be enforcing this rule by, for example, automated checks on (private) account activity. This doesn’t really mean they have to allow anyone to challenge other accounts.
So this …