Hoi, There are two conflicting approaches to vulnerabilities known to "government"; vulnerabilities make government vulnerable and therefore they need to be handled properly in code. The other approach is that a vulnerability is a vector to attack.
When Mrs Coleman works for the WMF, it follows that when she learns privately about vulnerabilities, they will be fixed discreetly. I am happy with that. When she does not learn about vulnerabilities and does not know about them either, nothing is different for us. When she actively knows about vulnerabilities and vectors to attack MediaWiki and does not share it with developers to fix them, she has a clear conflict of interest and should seek another job.
For me a simple statement that she works for the Wikimedia Foundation and will do everything in her power to make MediaWiki as good as it gets suffices. Anything more will get us in paranoia territory, we should not go there. Thanks, GerardM
On 2 November 2016 at 20:53, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
A similar thought crossed my mind regarding MediaWiki software. I believe that a number of USG agencies use MediaWiki, and that some of them use it for classified purposes. This is a bit of a two-edged sword; I imagine that they'd want to support the continued development of MediaWiki (which is good for us) but there would be interesting questions about whether they'd also want to introduce and/or keep open security vulnerabilities. I imagine that WMF considered Victoria's government affiliations carefully during the screening process, and I agree it would be nice to hear some clarifications about how WMF can ensure that any potential conflicts of interest are carefully managed.
My first instinct here is to welcome what looks like a person who's a good fit for the job. Victoria would be far from the only person in WMF and the Wikimedia community with ties to government agencies; I would treat this hire with a similar level of care regarding conflicts of interest as we would with any other appointment.
As a general practice, I would prefer declared and public potential conflicts of interests to undisclosed conflicts of interest, and I would suggest that someone being public with their affiliations and potential conflicts should be treated respectfully while keeping an open mind to the possibility that the conflicts may be manageable. In Victoria's case, I would encourage assuming good faith while asking appropriate questions; I feel that it's reasonable for the community to ask some questions to make sure that WMF did in fact consider these issues during the candidate selection process. Perhaps Victoria will have an office hour where the community can have a Q&A with her on these and many other questions that people are likely to have.
Regards,
Pine
Pine
On Wed, Nov 2, 2016 at 12:25 PM, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
It's great that the CTO position was filled.
The blog announcement's biography omitted these details:
"As Director for Security Initiatives for Intel’s Digital Enterprise Group [Victoria Coleman] was responsible for defining the company’s security technology roadmap and translating it to product delivery. During this time, she was instrumental in bringing Intel’s LaGrande Technology across the server processor and chipset product line. Victoria has also had roles as the Director of the Trusted Platform Laboratory and the Trust and Manageability Laboratory in Intel's Corporate Technology Group... In 1995 she authored the landmark UK Ministry of Defence DefStan 00-56 which created the legal framework for the safety of programmable electronic systems procurement by the MoD . In 2004, she founded the Cybersecurity Research Center on behalf of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security."
Source: http://www.potomacinstitute.org/fellows/2138-the-potomac- institute-welcomes-senior-fellow-victoria-coleman-2
Is Victoria willing to comment on
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2014/01/nsa_exploit_of.html
and
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk: Jimbo_Wales/Archive_208&oldid=725820016#Massive_expansion_ of_National_Security_Letters
please?
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