[WikiEN-l] Privacy Study Looking for Volunteers

[Oliver Keyes]

At this point we're really getting somewhat off-topic; Brian, if you
want to continue this discussion about the trade-offs around privacy
and oversight, feel free to drop me an email. In the meantime, we
should probably leave the thread for the original subject  ;)

On 29 March 2015 at 14:55, Oliver Keyes <okeyes at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Yes, you did state that, but you equated the explanation and
> circumstances with the NSA's behaviour, when in actual fact they are
> very different. I note that while you've argued that privacy policies
> aren't read, that's as far as your rebuttal goes.
>
> There's no trump of one principle over another, and this is nothing to
> do with content neutrality; again, I invite you to surface your
> proposal on enwiki. It will completely eliminate the utility of
> checkuser or hard-blocks or range blocks, but if the community wants
> it as much as you seem to think I'm sure they'll support the idea.
>
> On 29 March 2015 at 14:10, Brian J Mingus <brian.mingus at colorado.edu> wrote:
>> In general people do not read privacy policies, nor do they understand what
>> IP addresses are or what you can do with them.
>>
>> But if you recall, I simply stated that recording IP addresses is invasive.
>> And it is.
>>
>> This is especially true when you know that your recordings are faciliating
>> the active de-anonymization of people who are editing Wikipedia. Not just
>> de-anonymization, but often public shaming.
>>
>> For WMF, the principle of neutrality clearly trumps the principles of
>> privacy and free speech. For the NSA, substitute security for neutrality.
>> It's hypocritical.
>>
>> Luckily, it's easy to fix. Just stuff the ip fields with random numbers and
>> deal with the fallout. Stop tracking people.
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Mar 29, 2015 at 2:02 PM, Oliver Keyes <okeyes at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> In order:
>>>
>>> 1. Yes, the WMF is suing the NSA. There are a few threads/blog posts
>>> about this people here can point you to.
>>> 2. Brian: The NSA needs to store data without the permission or
>>> consent of the people generating it, sometimes through forcible
>>> interception, decryption and the introduction and maintenance of
>>> software exploits that allow them to do this but also allow any other
>>> reasonably technical nation or non-nation actor who is paying
>>> attention to exploit the same vulnerability, keeping this data for an
>>> indefinite period, with very little legal or political oversight, in
>>> order to stop terrorism, where very little evidence exists that this
>>> has helped in any way.
>>>
>>> The WMF needs to store data for a 90 day period, which is explicitly
>>> set down in a privacy policy that is transparent, human-readable,
>>> linked from every edit interface, written with the involvement of the
>>> people whose data is being stored, administered by a committee of
>>> people who come from this population of editors, and explicitly sets
>>> out what the data may or may not be used for, even within the
>>> Wikimedia Foundation, in order to stop vandalism, where multiple
>>> scientific studies have validated the hypothesis that being able to
>>> make rangeblocks and prohibit sockpuppetry is beneficial to the
>>> community we are all a part of and the wider population of readers.
>>>
>>> That's what's actually going on, here. If you thing these situations
>>> are roughly analogous, that's your prerogative. If you think the
>>> storage of this data is unnecessary, I recommend you go to your local
>>> project and explain to them that being able to checkuser potential
>>> sockpuppets or hard-block users is not needed: gaining consensus there
>>> would be a good starting point to changing this.
>>>
>>> On 29 March 2015 at 11:57, James Farrar <james.farrar at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> > Wikipedia is suing the NSA? Seriously?
>>> > On 28 Mar 2015 11:23, "Brian J Mingus" <brian.mingus at colorado.edu>
>>> > wrote:
>>> >
>>> >> It has worked up to now, but I'm thinking that, especially given
>>> >> Wikimedia
>>> >> is suing the NSA, it is no longer justifiable. If the NSA can't track
>>> >> citizens, Wikimedia shouldn't be tracking them either. Seems simple :)
>>> >>
>>> >> On Thu, Mar 26, 2015 at 2:56 PM, Francesco Ariis <fa-ml at ariis.it>
>>> >> wrote:
>>> >>
>>> >> > On Wed, Mar 25, 2015 at 01:19:35PM -0400, Brian J Mingus wrote:
>>> >> > > I think it's rather curious that edits to Wikipedia aren't private.
>>> >> > > Why
>>> >> > log
>>> >> > > the IP address? Why log anything? It's invasive.
>>> >> >
>>> >> > I guess it's a sensible choice against abuse (vandalism) while still
>>> >> > allowing non registered users editing rights
>>> >> >
>>> >> >
>>> >> > _______________________________________________
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>>> >> >
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>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Oliver Keyes
>>> Research Analyst
>>> Wikimedia Foundation
>>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Oliver Keyes
> Research Analyst
> Wikimedia Foundation



-- 
Oliver Keyes
Research Analyst
Wikimedia Foundation