Quoting the old DMARC document means quoting the replaced one

Answer A seller who says the solo ad domain is compliant per RFC 7489 is quoting the document RFC 9989 replaced in May 2026. RFC 7489 is the older experimental DMARC specification. The current one is RFC 9989. The thing to read is still the live p= tag, not a document number on a slide.

The note that started this: RFC 7489, Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance (DMARC), RFC 7489.

August can close on this. The month started with the From line, which is the domain DMARC looks at. It ends with the habit of citing a specification that no longer governs that look. You do not need a new religion. You need the seller to name the current document, and then to show the record anyway, because a correct citation without a record is still a speech.

RFC 7489 was Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance, published as an experimental protocol. It taught the industry the shape we still use: a DNS record, alignment with SPF or DKIM, a policy, reports. RFC 9989, in May 2026, obsoletes it and moves the specification onto the standards track. Obsolete means a careful reader stops treating 7489 as the authority. It does not mean every domain that followed 7489 must turn its mail off. It means the seller's paperwork should name the document that replaced it, and should not wave the old number as a credential.

What is RFC 7489 now?

RFC 7489 is the older experimental DMARC document. RFC 9989, published in May 2026, obsoletes it. A seller who says compliant per RFC 7489 is quoting the replaced document.

Compliance is already a slippery word. Mailboxes do not hand out a certificate because a TXT record exists. They apply the policy they see, or they apply their own judgment on top of it. A sentence that says compliant per a replaced RFC is two steps removed from the record. First, the document is not the one to cite. Second, the record's p= value is the only policy a participating receiver was asked to follow. Ask for the value. Accept none, quarantine, or reject as descriptions. Do not accept compliant as a description.

This note will not repeat anyone else's study of how many domains publish which tag. Those counts live in those studies. Your order has one domain. Look it up. If you buy solo ads, that lookup is part of the buying, the same way the from-name is part of the buying.

• The citation, if they need one, is RFC 9989.
• RFC 7489 is described as replaced, not as the badge.
• p= from the live domain is written on the quote.
• A slide that says compliant is not a substitute for the lookup.

Does the replacement mean a domain with DMARC is suddenly unsafe?

No. The live TXT record still carries the policy. Ask what p= says, and whether the solo ad aligns. The document number on a slide does not change the record. Citing the obsolete number is the problem.

A domain at p=none under the new specification is still a domain at p=none. Reports, if they asked for reports, still matter. Quarantine and reject still mean what they meant. The May document's housekeeping, including the historic tags discussed on the 15th, does not erase a real policy. It tells you which tags to stop bragging about. A seller who updates the citation and keeps a sloppy, unaligned send has fixed the footnote and kept the failure. Alignment is the send. The footnote is the footnote.

If you sell the mail, update the one-pager this weekend. Strike 7489. Name 9989 if you name a number at all. Then put the actual record in the buyer's quote, because the number is not what their reader will experience. The record plus the signature is what a mailbox can see.

What should the August quote require?

Require the From domain, the p= value, the signing domain on a live message, and a statement that the seller is not treating RFC 7489 as the current specification. Then pay, or do not.

That is a short order for the end of the month. The From domain matches the list the reader joined. p= is a word you can check. The signer aligns, or the quote admits it does not. The old document number is not doing any work. Add the exit, the complaint path, and the refund if the live message does not match. Leave the rest of the adjectives in the draft.

September can worry about the next send. Solo ad pricing for this one should buy a domain that can survive being looked up. RFC 7489 had its turn. The record on the domain is the policy. Read it before the month turns.