Talk:WMF Global Ban Policy/Archives/2017

Paid Editing

@WMFOffice: Could you globally ban User:Morning277 and User:Orangemoody because they are all guilty of committing paid editing. 111.65.45.147 09:33, 13 September 2017 (UTC)

Procedure for blacklisting?

I see three accounts have been added to the global blacklist in the last week. Is there any public facing explanation provided for any ban, or any explanation of the procedural process? E.g., can the permaban decision be made by an executive, a subcommittee, or only the WMF board?--Milowent (talk) 16:43, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

@Milowent: The reasons for banning those users are known only to the WMF staff themselves. -ArdiPras95 (talk) 01:25, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

@Milowent: However, the procedure for WMF bans can be found here. -ArdiPras95 (talk) 05:34, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

@Milowent: Hello Milowent. I realise it's been a while since you asked this question, so I offer my apologies for the delay in responding. The WMF Global ban policy has been recently updated in order to offer more transparency regarding the process followed by Foundation staff and better reflect current practices regarding this type of office action. The reasons behind a global ban are not disclosed; you can find some more information about this under the General information section of this policy. You can also find information on the type of behaviour that may result in a global ban, under the Criteria for consideration of a global ban section of this policy. As for the people involved in reviewing a decision for a global ban before its implementation, you can review the Global ban policy procedure; more specifically, items 4, 6 and 7. This is not different than the page kindly linked by ArdiPras95, which refers to Foundation office actions. I hope the above is helpful. Kalliope (WMF) (talk) 10:11, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

Can a WMF Globally Banned User be blocked from even accessing/entering a WMF Wiki?

@WMFOffice: Can a WMF Globally Banned User be blocked from even accessing/entering a WMF Wiki? Thanks, 111.65.45.222 02:59, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

The basic answer is No. It is technically possible to ban an IP or IP range from accessing any web site, but it is highly unlikely that the WMF would do this, it could cause serious collateral damage, and any banned user could easily get around it by using different access, leading to a need for more and more enforcement labor with little value to the projects. It might even violate the TOS. (Licensing of content may depend on access to it). The maximum WMF action, short of legal action outside of wiki process, is a global lock, which prevents log-in for an account. It is not possible to a-priori block all account registration for a banned user, but if the WMF assigns the labor, or monitors volunteer reporting, it may be able to quickly detect banned user attempts and may lock these new accounts even before they edit anything, or otherwise very quickly. They may also keep abstracted long-term access records, distinct from the short-term records used by checkusers. (Sometimes checkusers keep private records -- "notes" -- on problem accounts.) --Abd (talk) 16:08, 7 October 2017 (UTC)

That would also be "overkill", though their participation is unwanted having access to useful information 🛈 from the various Wikimedia projects simply is something that is paramount to the goal of these Wikimedia projects as "free information 🛈" is why we are contributing here. (just the word "free" for them means gratis as opposed to libre). --Donald Trung (Talk 🤳🏻) (My global lock 😒🌏🔒) (My global unlock 😄🌏🔓) 12:38, 19 October 2017 (UTC)

Are Foundation unbans possible? The (current) text itself seems contradictory.

Dear employees of the Wikimedia Foundation,

I am currently drafting a proposition for community unbans to community bans, however Wikimedia Foundation office bans don't seem to have the same wording as community global bans and instead are worded under appeals as “Foundation global bans are final; they are not appealable, not negotiable and not reversible.” But a mere sentence prior to this states “On the day the ban goes into effect, globally banned users are notified of their status and appeals options privately{.}” so from what I can tell those affected by Foundation bans … can appeal only to the Wikimedia Foundation? This is even if the communities themselves oppose the bans such as with Russavia. Currently the list is very small, and as far as I can see every name (except for Krisdegioia) having major contributors to Wikimedia projects. Information that I have been able to dig up Mr. Gregory Kohs seems to be (currently) unaware as to why he was Foundation banned, 🤔 and other users such as Reguyla are major contributors and even admins on Wikia projects as can be seen here. Though I do not sympathise with those that would send legal threats and most certainly won't accept any advocacy for pedophilia (which would seem the logic to ban those regardless of contributions) it is simply not possible for anyone to find out why someone has been banned as can be seen here. This is despite the recurring statement “OFFICE action: please contact legal@wikimedia.org with questions.” (Beta M) 🤥

Moreover serious off-wiki harassment in this case didn't prompt an Office action. I personally think that Reguyla would be a major benefit for the Simple English Wikipedia and would wish for seeing someone as active as him (as I’m also a major user of various Wikia projects) would like for him to return one day. The largest problem I have with this page is its wording as it states “Foundation global bans are not a replacement for on-wiki processes, and are not be used to correct perceived “mistakes” that resulted from legitimate on-wiki process; local policies remain primary on all Wikimedia projects{.}” which would almost indicate that community unbans of these people would be possible, and as said before some of them could appeal while the appeals section claims that appeals to the Foundation are impossible. Personally I would like to get some clarification on this before I would make a proposal that might come off as wanting to help some of the people here to “evade their ban”. 😰

In the future I do hope to see things like (that all these red-links will become blue-links):

• Request for comment/Global unban of Reguyla
• Request for comment/Global unban of Messina
• Request for comment/Global unban of WMFMicrosoftOffice
• Request for comment/Global unban of Russavia
• Request for comment/Global unban of Poetlister
• Request for comment/Global unban of Dcoetzee

However if we as the community have no say in allowing their rehabilitation and eventual participation then I will only concern my (eventual) proposal with community banned users being community unbanned if they would be eligible (thus banned for non-legal reasons, think of that user that just kept adding information 🛈 on his village in Bosnia & Herzegovina into random wiki’s or people like D.A. Borgdorff who was a mostly positive contributors until he started spamming a non-existing book 📚). Well my questions mostly regard the permanence of these Foundation global bans, and honestly the lack of openness from the Wikimedia Foundation regarding the sensitive nature of some of the information that lead to the Foundation bans might make any community unbanning ineffective as we can’t judge if the situation have changed if we're unaware of the situation.

Also I prefer for the information 🛈 replied in response to the above to be documented on-wiki so please don't e-mail 📧 me or otherwise message me the response off-wiki.

Yours faithfully, Donald Trung Quoc Don 👲🏻

Sent from my Microsoft Lumia 950 XL with Microsoft Windows 10 Mobile 📱. --Donald Trung (Talk 🤳🏻) (My global lock 😒🌏🔒) (My global unlock 😄🌏🔓) 12:35, 19 October 2017 (UTC)