Steps to reproduce
Type single square brackets in your note, as if to paraphrase a quotation.
Examples:
"Information units from individual pages or slides accounted for 38% of resource [sic] that participants imported into the tool""re-composition [...] causes further separation of the information organization [...] from the document organization"
Do not define these as reference links anywhere in the document, i.e. do not use the following syntax:
[...]: https://foo.example/
[sic]: https://sic.example/
Did you follow the troubleshooting guide? [Y/N]
Yes.
Expected result
The paraphrasing or paraphrasings in single square brackets are not highlighted as links, if they are not defined as links.
Actual result
All single square bracket usage is highlighted as if it were a link, even when it is not a link.
Environment
SYSTEM INFO:
Obsidian version: 1.12.7
Installer version: 1.12.7
Operating system: #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Fri, 15 May 2026 16:45:15 +0000 7.0.8-arch1-1
Login status: not logged in
Language: en
Insider build toggle: off
Live preview: off
Base theme: adapt to system
Community theme: none
Snippets enabled: 0
Restricted mode: on
RECOMMENDATIONS:
none
Additional information
Paraphrasing is a common technique used in academic writing which allows using quotations in a way that flows more naturally in the structure of a sentence. Style guides use square brackets to demarcate and denote paraphrased content within a quote or quotation.
However, Markdown and CommonMark intepret single square brackets as potential link anchors. This is not necessarily a conflict; some uses of single square brackets may be appropriately linked, such as actual [link references].
[link references]: https://spec.commonmark.org/0.31.2/#link-reference-definitions
For single square bracket usage that is not defined as a reference link, then please do not use syntax highlighting here that makes it look like a link (when it is not a link).
(Tangentially, it appears that link references might not be supported properly in Obsidian currently. It would be nice to have that, but this topic is about the erroneous syntax highlighting.)