On 1 July 2012 21:46, James Forrester james@jdforrester.org wrote:
On 1 July 2012 13:00, Tom Morris tom@tommorris.org wrote:
None of which will matter if the law is so broadly drawn that Wikimedia UK or even an individual Wikimedian could be held to be an operator of a telecommunications system.
It's entirely foreseeable that UK police would consider anyone with 'higher' rights (probably +sysop, definitely +bureaucrat, and without-doubt +oversight, +checkuser, and +steward) as having sufficient level of control and access to privileged data that normal members of the public wouldn't that they count as 'operators'.
How about we avoid spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt?
The courts have always been able to subpoena people to provide evidence. This act is about requiring people to store information so that it is available should someone want to subpoena it. Do you think the Secretary of State is going to order a British checkuser to download the whole checkuser log everyday and store it just in case the authorities later think there might be something in there relevant to an investigation?