Roles and permissions

Last updated: 1 October 2026

Who can perform which actions

Sinter has a small set of roles. This page is the single published answer to what each one may do; the same table is shown to moderators and the operator inside the app. If a control is not on screen, it is because your account lacks the required authority. The server checks ownership, effective roles and grants on every request. Roles can overlap; a conditional entry needs the additional authority described in its row.

Who Can Perform Which Actions. Each row is verified on the server, so hiding a control never grants access.
Action	Operator (owner)	Platform moderator	Community owner	Community moderator	Member	Restricted member	Blocked or signed out
Read public postsPublic posts and communities are readable without an account.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Manage your own accountYour username, display name, profile details, sessions, notifications and deletion.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Create a communityA new community you own. Held back on very new accounts while they settle in. A restriction in another community does not prevent creation.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Post and commentStart threads and reply, subject to community rules and a posting restriction if one applies to you.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Vote on contentUpvote or downvote. Votes in a community where you are restricted do not change the tally. Your vote history is private to you.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Save contentSave a post or comment for later, including while restricted from posting in its community.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Report contentSend a post, comment, profile or message to moderation.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Review reports and evidenceRead the platform reports and report evidence. Operators and community owners need a separate effective moderator grant.	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Hide or restore contentTake reported content out of public view, or put it back, with a written reason.	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Restrict a member from postingPause one member from posting in a community while leaving them able to read. Never applies to that community's owner.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Suspend or reinstate an accountPlatform-wide account action through the owner console. A separate community ban role is not implemented.	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No
Edit community settingsDescription, rules, comment order and rules reminders in the community you moderate. Renaming, flair and post types remain owner-only.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Pin or unpin community postsThe community owner, its appointed moderators, platform moderators and operator can manage up to two pins.	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Grant or revoke moderationGive or take away platform moderation, with the reason recorded in the role-change audit.	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No
Transfer build ownershipHand your build to an existing build member. Community ownership transfer is not implemented by this endpoint.Must be the current build owner; no platform role bypasses ownership.	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	No
Publish in an official channelPost in a designated official channel, subject to normal posting gates. Operator, moderator or owner status alone grants no publishing authority.Requires OFFICIAL_PUBLISHER_IDS configuration or a publisher grant for this channel.	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	Conditional	No
Use the owner consoleAnalytics, cost alerts, support requests, incidents, legal requests, platform switches and account actions.	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No

The roles

Community owners can appoint up to 10 moderators for their own community. Community moderators manage its day-to-day moderation and can step down, while the owner keeps control of its name, ownership and moderator appointments.

Operator (owner): Set in server configuration, never from the app. Runs the owner console, the official channel and emergency controls.
Platform moderator: Granted by the operator from the moderation panel, with a reason recorded. Polices reported content across the platform.
Community owner: The account that owns the community. Ownership alone does not grant access to the platform reports.
Community moderator: Appointed by the community owner to moderate that community. Can manage its description, rules, pins, threads, restrictions and content rules, but cannot rename it or appoint other moderators.
Member: A signed-in account in good standing. Reads, posts, comments, votes and reports.
Restricted member: A member paused from posting in one community. Can still read, save and report there; votes there do not affect the tally.
Blocked or signed out: No session, or a suspended account. Public reading only.

When a control is not yours

Reaching a moderator-only or operator-only action shows one clear line - only moderators of this community can do this - rather than a button that does nothing or a raw error. If you think a moderation action was taken against you, you can appeal it once from Settings under Decisions and appeals, or write to support@joinsinter.com.

Official accounts

An "official" badge is decided by the server from the accounts the operator has designated. Nobody can claim it from the app, and a display name or handle that reads as Sinter or as Sinter staff is refused at the point it is chosen. Treat any account that asks you to trust it on its name alone as untrusted.