How about the 'powers-that-be' at eQSL petition the same at ARRL/CQ Magazine to allow eQSLs to be used for their contests, etc. again?
From what I understand (from our local club's Elmer), years ago, the site was rampant with 'cheaters' and that's why those two organizations decided to not allow eQSLs to be used; he also mentioned that in the recent few years, your 'security' has been improved over back then, but for some reason, the previously-mentioned two entities still won't allow them.
Am I correct in what I've been hearing from him?
"Educate" me.

Mike, W1DGL
Prescott, AZ.
DM34sm

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W1DGL Michael D. Belanger

Not sure where he got the information that " years ago, the site was rampant with 'cheaters'"

The chances of ARRL ever accepting eQSLs is slim, they promote LoTW as the only form of electronic confirmation.

CQ magazine on the other hand has accepted eQSLs for all of it's awards for many years now.

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73, Dave - VA3KAB

This is an excerpt from the email he sent me about it:

"For many years, eQSL did not verify QSOs - you could just go on to their site and say you worked a station and download their QSL. Of course, this almost guarantees cheating. So the 2 major award sponsors, CQ Magazine and ARRL, decided not to accept eQSLs for their awards. And to this day, many people are not as thorough as you and don't really check their QSOs. eQSL has made some changes in the last couple years, to improve security, but their reputation was made a long time ago. For all intents and purposes, you are wasting your time verifying those QSOs."

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W1DGL Michael D. Belanger

Total nonsense! There are certainly eQSL haters out there, and he is obviously one of them. Problem is people read crap like that and take it as fact, instead of finding out the truth for themselves.

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73, Dave - VA3KAB

What if eQSL were to do the double blind like LoTW and not submit a qsl card to either party unless both logs match? Would that satisfy the ARRL and then allow eQSL to count for their awards?

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73 de Jeff VE6EFR

No, unfortunately.

eQSL actually was double blind at one time, for a couple of months back in 2002.

A little background history:

eQSL was started in 2000 as a method to exchange electronic QSL cards, that was it's only mission back then. Sometime after that discussions were started with ARRL about having eQSLs count for their DXCC award. ARRL came up with changes they wanted to the eQSL site so that they would accept eQSLs for DXCC, one of which was double blind.

So, the system was changed over to be double blind, received lot's of complaints from the users about that.

Talks with ARRL stalled, turns out they were busy working on getting LoTW up and running all along.

So, in 2002 Dave N5UP reversed all of the double blind code and started the eAwards program, first one offered was the eDX100 award.

So, never say never, but the chances of ARRL ever changing it's position on eQSLs is slim.

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73, Dave - VA3KAB
Edited by VA3KAB David Bell on Mar 9, 2015 at 03:54 PM