Dear Friends,

We wish to bring your attention to important developments in Portugal.

We are concerned that an ongoing lawsuit against the Wikimedia Foundation in Portugal may be a strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP) designed to suppress well-sourced public information. 

To summarize, the court has so far ordered the Foundation to delete information from articles about the notable person who is suing us, and to identify the Wikipedians who added the content. The case could end up with a ruling that punishes individuals simply for summarizing and publishing on Wikipedia what was said about a notable person in news media. If a volunteer editor who works on an article can become liable for everything that is in the article, contributing to Wikipedia will become much more difficult not only in Portugal, but potentially elsewhere as well. This would have an undue chilling effect on freedom of expression and information worldwide.

We want to assure you that we are fighting this case for two reasons: 1) to protect the user data of volunteers contributing to political biographies; and, 2) to set an important precedent protecting the ability to write biographies of living persons. In the process, the Foundation has not provided any user data in this case. We are hopeful that the courts will agree with us on the importance of protecting freedom of information and good-faith discussion of public interest topics.

You can learn more about the details of the case and what it could mean for Wikimedia projects and volunteers in this blog post [1].

All the best,

Ziski & WMF Global Advocacy Team
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[1] https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/07/27/high-stakes-for-the-wikimedia-projects-in-portugal-fighting-a-strategic-lawsuit-against-public-participation-slapp/
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