[Wikimedia-l] CheckUser openness

[Nathan]

On Thu, Jun 14, 2012 at 4:52 PM, Risker <risker.wp at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> I do see where folks are coming from. To the best of my knowledge, for the
> past few years on English Wikipedia anyone who has asked the Audit
> Subcommittee if they have been checked has been told the correct response,
> and I think this is a good thing.
>
> On the other hand, what's being proposed here is essentially providing
> sockpuppeters or otherwise disruptive users (such as those under certain
> types of sanctions) a how-to guide so they can avoid detection in the
> future.
>
> Risker
>
>
Can you explain how this is so? I did a fair amount of work at SPI as a
clerk, and I'm not sure I understand how the mere fact that a check was
performed is giving sockpuppeters a roadmap for how to avoid detection. If
you mean they could test the CU net by running a bunch of socks on
different strategies to see which get checked and which don't, that seems
like a lot of work that a vanishingly small number of abusers would
attempt... and also basically the same information as they would receive
when those sock accounts are ultimately blocked or not blocked per CU.

~Nathan