2008/6/6 FT2 ft2.wiki@gmail.com:
From [[Meta:Help:Checkuser]], the main WMF guidance page, the full quote: The first versions of the WMF guidance/help page from October 2005 stated the same: Oct 2005: "If they're on a large ISP (e.g. AOL, NTL, BT, Telstra), they're one of millions and it's not personally identifiable." "Revealing the country is generally not personally identifiable (e.g. "User:Querulous is coming in from the UK, User:Sockpuppet is coming in from Canada")." http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help:CheckUser&oldid=226259
BTW, this was text I wrote at the time as part of a quick guide to checkuser for checkers. So it was basically my opinion - not a Foundation rule - that revealing countries didn't violate the privacy policy. This appears to have stuck, but it is of course subject to change should people feel strongly and make a good case that revealing countries does.
- d.