Subject: Protocol Action: 'Signalling one-click functionality for list email headers' to Proposed Standard (draft-levine-herkula-oneclick-04.txt)

From: The IESG <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2016 08:56:09 -0800

The IESG has approved the following document:
- 'Signalling one-click functionality for list email headers'
  (draft-levine-herkula-oneclick-04.txt) as Proposed Standard

This document has been reviewed in the IETF but is not the product of an
IETF Working Group.

The IESG contact person is Alexey Melnikov.

A URL of this Internet Draft is:
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-levine-herkula-oneclick/

Technical Summary

   An [RFC2369] email header field can contain HTTPS [RFC7230] URIs.  In
   a List-Unsubscribe header field the HTTPS URI is intended to
   unsubscribe the recipient of the email from the list.  But anti-spam
   software often fetches all resources in mail header fields
   automatically, without any action by the user, and there is no
   mechanical way for a sender to tell a request made automatically by
   anti-spam software from one manually requested by a user.  To prevent
   accidental unsubscriptions, senders return landing pages with a
   confirmation step to finish the unsubscribe request that a live user
   would recognize and act on, but an automated system would not.  This
   makes the unsubscription process more complex than a single click.

This document has several goals.

   o  Allow email senders to signal that a [RFC2369] List-Unsubscribe
      header field has One-Click functionality.

   o Prevent accidental unsubscriptions by issuing GET request on HTTPS
      URLs in the List-Unsubscribe header field.

   o  Allow MUA users to unsubscribe from mailing lists in a familiar
      environment and without leaving the MUA context.  A receiving
      system can process an unsubscription request in the background
      without further interaction, and know that it can be fully
      processed by the mail sender's system.

Working Group Summary

   This is not a WG document, but the document was discussed on the DISPATCH mailing list.

Document Quality

   At least two mail providers are planning to implement this specification.
   Permanent Header Field registration was performed by Graham Klyne.
   (Email thread to IESG starting on October 13th)

Personnel

   The Document Shepherd for this document is Paul Kincaid-Smith. The responsible Area Director is Alexey Melnikov.

RFC Editor Note

  In Section 5, please replace one ABNF production:

 OLD:
   ldh = ALPHA 0*(ALPHA | DIGIT | "-")

 NEW:
   ldh = ALPHA 0*(ALPHA / DIGIT / "-")