On 3/20/07, Ron Ritzman ritzman@gmail.com wrote:
On 3/20/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Can an IP address technically be considered a "sock puppet"? If so then anybody who forgets to log in before editing is "sockpuppeting". I have done that a few times after failing to notice that my login cookie has expired.
No, because sockpuppeting involves intent to appear to be a second person.
So when an IP address is listed in a "sockpuppets of" catagory, it's because in somebody's opinion, the user in question is editing anonymously to appear as two different users.
And/or that IP address was publically identified as one that the sockpuppeteer was using.
We can't release Checkuser results in general, but if it turns out that a sock edited as an anon IP user and we can identify that (obvious goofs such as editing as anon, then logging in and changing the signature on an edit, etc) then that's fair game.
Checkuser confidentiality only applies to CU info, not identifying info that abusers may happen to leave lying around themselves by accident...