WG Review: Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (dmarc)

A new IETF WG has been proposed in the Applications and Real-Time Area. The
IESG has not made any determination yet. The following draft charter was
submitted, and is provided for informational purposes only. Please send your
comments to the IESG mailing list (iesg@ietf.org) by 2025-05-23.

Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (dmarc)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Current status: Proposed WG

Chairs:
  Seth Blank <seth@valimail.com>
  Barry Leiba <barryleiba@computer.org>

Assigned Area Director:
  Andy Newton <andy@hxr.us>

Applications and Real-Time Area Directors:
  Orie Steele <orie@or13.io>
  Andy Newton <andy@hxr.us>

Mailing list:
  Address: dmarc@ietf.org
  To subscribe: https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/dmarc
  Archive: https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/browse/dmarc/

Group page: https://datatracker.ietf.org/group/dmarc/

Charter: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/charter-ietf-dmarc/

DMARC Charter

The previous DMARC working group, chartered from 2014 to 2025, was chartered
to produce a Standards Track revision to DMARC (RFC 7489), originally
published via the Independent Submissions stream. The revision to the
original document (draft-ietf-dmarc-dmarcbis-41), along with one of two
reporting documents (draft-ietf-dmarc-aggregate-reporting-32), was approved
by the IESG in 2025, and the working group closed shortly thereafter.

The closure of the previous DMARC working group in 2025 left behind a second
reporting document (draft-ietf-dmarc-failure-reporting-13) which, incomplete,
reverted to being an individual submission. There is little evidence of
uptake of this work in industry. However, it was overlooked that the base
document (draft-ietf-dmarc-dmarcbis-41) produced by the previous DMARC
working group includes normative references to this document
(draft-ietf-dmarc-failure-reporting-13), an artifact of the original DMARC
RFC. This issue needs to be resolved before the revised base document can
proceed to publication.

This DMARC working group is chartered for the sole purpose of completing the
failure reporting document (draft-ietf-dmarc-failure-reporting-13) and
sending it to the IESG for publication as a Standards Track item, or removing
failure reporting from DMARC in its entirety. This will complete the DMARC
document cluster (C539) and allow the base document to proceed. This working
group will adopt no other documents or work items. However, this working
group may reclaim the base document (draft-ietf-dmarc-dmarcbis-41) from the
RFC Editor only if it finds that edits are required to complete this charter
item, and then may alter it only to the extent necessary to meet this goal.

This working group will submit the failure reporting document
(draft-ietf-dmarc-failure-reporting-13) to the IESG no later than six months
from working group formation. If it fails to meet this deadline or reaches
consensus to cease work on the failure reporting document
(draft-ietf-dmarc-failure-reporting-13), it will abandon that objective and
instead begin the work of removing all references from the base document 
(draft-ietf-dmarc-failure-reporting-13) to the failure reporting document,
and the latter will be permanently abandoned.

Milestones:

  Nov 2025 - Request IESG to publish DMARC Failure Reporting I-D as Standards
  Track