Time to update your contact info:
The end of cpan.org email forwarding
If you are a CPAN author, you were assigned an @cpan.org email address which you may have been using for your Perl activities.
However, in April 2026 the Perl Network Operations Center (announced that cpan.org email forwarding had been shut down.
Why the shutdown happened
Over the years email forwarding has become increasingly unreliable. The security protections (like SPF, DKIM, DMARC, etc), have made it difficult to ensure that legitimate mail actually reached authors.
Privacy impact
The cpan.org email forwarding could be used to provide some privacy, as it could hide your real email address. If you need your email to remain anonymous or psuedonymous, consider signing up for one of the many privacy-preserving email services, and use that address for your PAUSE account.
What this means
Messages sent to your @cpan.org address will now bounce.
Things you can do right now
Please take the following steps to update your distribution and profile data:
Update and release your modules
Many CPAN authors hardcoded their @cpan.org email address into documentation (README, Changes, POD sections) or the distribution’s build files (Makefile.PL, Build.PL, Dist::Zilla configs).
Update your module configuration files with your current email address and release a new version of your module.
MetaCPAN and downstream packaging systems will then index your updated contact info.
Add a .mailmap file to your git repository
If you used your @cpan.org email address in your git commits, tools mapping contributions might find the incorrect contact details.
Add a standard .mailmap file to the root of your repository. This file maps your old @cpan.org commit email to your current public address, ensuring commit history and toolchains credit you correctly without displaying broken contact info.
Example .mailmap file
Firstname Lastname <proper_username@host.example> <commit_username@old-host.example>
Review any websites where you may have used your @cpan.org email address
If you used your @cpan.org email address to login or, for notifications, on any website you will need to review those applications and try to change your email address to a valid address. Some web applications may not allow you to change the email address if, as in this case, email to that address is bouncing. You may need to work with support for the website to change the email address.
Make your PAUSE private email address public
By default, PAUSE keeps your registration email hidden and relied on the cpan.org alias for public profile pages.
- Log into PAUSE
- Go to Edit Account Info
- Update the “Publicly visible email address” in your profile settings to your correct (non-cpan.org) email address.
This allows MetaCPAN and your author profile page to display a functioning email address to the community which allows your users to contact you in the event of an bug or securiyty vulnerability.
If your module has a vulnerability and your listed contact is a dead @cpan.org address, CPANSec cannot easily reach you.
Updating your contact details helps to ensure that the Perl and CPAN ecosystem remains safe. Take 10 minutes this week to review your modules and update your PAUSE profiles!