Talk:Privacy policy/Archives/2009

Localisation of new privacy policy

It would be helpful in the translation of the new privacy policy to have a definition of the phrase 'personally identifiable information'. Can someone provide this? Lloffiwr 14:11, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

He pointed me to w:Personally identifiable information. Cbrown1023 talk 21:00, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, I understand this much better now, and have put the link to the article on the talk page of the translation request for others to follow. Lloffiwr 23:26, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

How do I report

How do I report someone adding something to my view ie. Chris Brown as if it's coming from me? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.95.40.84 (talk • contribs) 05:32, 25 February 2009 (UTC).

policy violation?

The policy says that info on page visits are not exposed publically, but there is a bot which is publishing page after page of user's search terms along with their username and I think for non-users IP address: here are many such pages: [1] also failed search terms are logged: [2] (there are dozens of archives of the above page stretching back several months, with page names of the form ../archive26). Given the controversy over search engines retaining user data and in some cases publishing it, these pages seem a gross violation of user privacy. Do wikipedia visitors know that the search terms they use have become a matter of public record? I doubt it. Weeksinput 03:36, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

You're mistaken. The bot is posting its own search results. It searches new pages and posts a list of those it finds. The username you see next to each page is the page's creator. This is confirmed by looking at the history of the page. That bot is not publishing users' search results. -Kotra 17:14, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

translation of page view

Regarding Where the information pertains to page views generated by a spider or bot and its dissemination is necessary to illustrate or resolve technical issues in the section 'Access to and release of personally identifiable information'. I have looked at the definition of page view on Wikipedia. But I am still not sure that I understand what 'page views generated by a spider or bot' are. Can anyone explain this in layman's terms? Lloffiwr 11:16, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Bots and spiders, in this context, are computer programs set up to automatically visit webpages, without anyone actually sitting behind the screen. For example, search engines like Google have spiders that run around the web, reading webpage after webpage, to create an index of the web that you can search. Email spammers use bots too, to search the web for email addresses.

"Page views generated by a spider or bot", then, would occur whenever a bot visited a webpage. Wikimedia's software would detect the bot's visit as a page view, just like the page views of actual humans.

One reason I can think of why they would have this line is so administrators, checkusers, and other volunteer editors can take action against bots that are set up to add commercial links (linkspam) into articles. There are probably other reasons as well, or they may just be putting that out for unforeseen contingencies.

If you're really curious, though, you might try to track down User:UninvitedCompany, who originally added the text back in 2003. -Kotra 03:04, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for the clear and detailed explanation - I now have a much better idea of how to translate this sentence. Lloffiwr 12:49, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Scope of the policy - certain aspects of browsing

Regarding Interactions with the Projects not covered by this Policy include, but are not limited to, aspects of browsing and editing pages in the section Activities on Foundation projects.

The paragraph is mostly dealing with some ways that the user can voluntarily disclose her own private data. When the user is sending email or creating OTRS ticket, it is obvious that by the very nature of those communications some private data will be disclosed. It is clear, that anonymous editing is one of the the aspects of editing pages, since the IP address becomes public by the very nature of that interaction and becomes publicly available data and therefore not covered by this policy, although they may be covered by some other policies (like that one of the OTRS).

However, I do not to understand the which aspects of browsing may constitute publicly available information not covered by this policy. The policy deals extensively with Web server access logs as well as with privacy implications of certain HTTP features like cookies.

So, the question is, which aspects of browsing the Wikimedia sites are not covered by this privacy policy? I understand that this is just list of examples ("...not limited to...") but my understanding to date that all aspects of passive browsing were covered under this policy.

 « Saper // @talk »  02:04, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

justsuki@yahoo.com

need neww password,cant log in

disclosure of user realnames - no policy?

I've always thought that the disclosure of the realname of a person behind a user account by another user on talkpages or in edit-commentaries, as it happens sometimes in edit-conflicts between users, is a no-no in all Wikimedia projects. However, when looking for written policy, I couldn't find anything about that. Any hint? --Túrelio 08:26, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

How do I report

How do I report someone adding something to my view ie. Chris Brown as if it's coming from me? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.95.40.84 (talk • contribs) 05:32, 25 February 2009 (UTC).

policy violation?

The policy says that info on page visits are not exposed publically, but there is a bot which is publishing page after page of user's search terms along with their username and I think for non-users IP address: here are many such pages: [3] also failed search terms are logged: [4] (there are dozens of archives of the above page stretching back several months, with page names of the form ../archive26). Given the controversy over search engines retaining user data and in some cases publishing it, these pages seem a gross violation of user privacy. Do wikipedia visitors know that the search terms they use have become a matter of public record? I doubt it. Weeksinput 03:36, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

You're mistaken. The bot is posting its own search results. It searches new pages and posts a list of those it finds. The username you see next to each page is the page's creator. This is confirmed by looking at the history of the page. That bot is not publishing users' search results. -Kotra 17:14, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

translation of page view

Regarding Where the information pertains to page views generated by a spider or bot and its dissemination is necessary to illustrate or resolve technical issues in the section 'Access to and release of personally identifiable information'. I have looked at the definition of page view on Wikipedia. But I am still not sure that I understand what 'page views generated by a spider or bot' are. Can anyone explain this in layman's terms? Lloffiwr 11:16, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Bots and spiders, in this context, are computer programs set up to automatically visit webpages, without anyone actually sitting behind the screen. For example, search engines like Google have spiders that run around the web, reading webpage after webpage, to create an index of the web that you can search. Email spammers use bots too, to search the web for email addresses.

"Page views generated by a spider or bot", then, would occur whenever a bot visited a webpage. Wikimedia's software would detect the bot's visit as a page view, just like the page views of actual humans.

One reason I can think of why they would have this line is so administrators, checkusers, and other volunteer editors can take action against bots that are set up to add commercial links (linkspam) into articles. There are probably other reasons as well, or they may just be putting that out for unforeseen contingencies.

If you're really curious, though, you might try to track down User:UninvitedCompany, who originally added the text back in 2003. -Kotra 03:04, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for the clear and detailed explanation - I now have a much better idea of how to translate this sentence. Lloffiwr 12:49, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Scope of the policy - certain aspects of browsing

Regarding Interactions with the Projects not covered by this Policy include, but are not limited to, aspects of browsing and editing pages in the section Activities on Foundation projects.

The paragraph is mostly dealing with some ways that the user can voluntarily disclose her own private data. When the user is sending email or creating OTRS ticket, it is obvious that by the very nature of those communications some private data will be disclosed. It is clear, that anonymous editing is one of the the aspects of editing pages, since the IP address becomes public by the very nature of that interaction and becomes publicly available data and therefore not covered by this policy, although they may be covered by some other policies (like that one of the OTRS).

However, I do not to understand the which aspects of browsing may constitute publicly available information not covered by this policy. The policy deals extensively with Web server access logs as well as with privacy implications of certain HTTP features like cookies.

So, the question is, which aspects of browsing the Wikimedia sites are not covered by this privacy policy? I understand that this is just list of examples ("...not limited to...") but my understanding to date that all aspects of passive browsing were covered under this policy.

 « Saper // @talk »  02:04, 20 May 2009 (UTC)