Newsmaker: In search of the Wikipedia prankster

On Sunday, the New York Times published a story naming the author of a controversial and false Wikipedia article about the longtime journalist John Seigenthaler Sr.

In the Wikipedia article, the then-anonymous author wrote that Seigenthaler, once an assistant to Robert Kennedy, may have been involved in his assassination, as well as that of his brother, President John F. Kennedy.

The article stayed on Wikipedia--the free, open-access encyclopedia--for four months before Seigenthaler finally got the service's founder, Jimmy Wales, to agree to take it down. Shortly afterward, Seigenthaler published a scathing Op-Ed piece in USA Today, attacking Wikipedia's accountability and credibility.

In the days that followed, a San Antonio, Texas, book indexer named Daniel Brandt set out to find the article's author. Brandt, who had had his own problems with a faulty Wikipedia biography, also runs Wikipedia Watch, a sometimes paranoid, sometimes rational Web site that seeks to keep the project honest. He also runs Google Watch, a similar site about the search leader.

Following clues about the IP address of the computer used to post the Seigenthaler article, Brandt set out to find its author and in the process demonstrate some of Wikipedia's core problems. Over the course of two days of sleuthing, Brandt traced the IP address to a small courier service in Nashville, Tenn., and within hours, the culprit, Brian Chase, confessed directly to Seigenthaler.

CNET News.com recently tracked down Brandt and picked his brain about why he got involved in the search for Chase and why he thinks Wikipedia is flawed.

Q: So tell me about how you actually tracked down Brian Chase.
Brandt: All I had was the IP address and the date and timestamp, and the various databases said it was a BellSouth DSL account in Nashville. I started playing with the search engines and using different tools to try to see if I could find out more about that IP address. They wouldn't respond to trace router pings, which means that they were blocked at a firewall, probably at BellSouth.

But the thing is, when you look at the structure it is so easy for Wikipedia to get into trouble on this stuff. The internal architecture of how they develop articles is flawed.

But very strangely, there was a server on the IP address. You almost never see that, since at most companies, your browsers and your servers are on different IP addresses. Only a very small company that didn't know what it was doing would have that kind of arrangement. I put in the IP address directly, and then it comes back and said, "Welcome to Rush Delivery." It didn't occur to me for about 30 minutes that maybe that was the name of a business in Nashville. Sure enough they had a one-page Web site. So the next day I sent them a fax.

So after they gave you the runaround, what happened?
The next night, I got the idea of sending a phony e-mail, I mean an e-mail under a phony name, phony account. When they responded, sure enough, the originating IP address matched the one that was in Seigenthaler's column.

I see.
I called Seigenthaler and I said I have proof that the IP address (was the same). We still didn't know Brian's name at that point, but the very next day some guy named Brian Chase walks into Seigenthaler's offices at Vanderbilt University and delivers the confessional letter.

So sum up why you got involved.
Well, I was really sympathetic with the position that Seigenthaler found himself in. The thing most people don't understand about Wikipedia is that sometimes they get into trouble because the press notices something about Wikipedia, like two months ago there was the article on Jane Fonda and another one on Bill Gates, which even Jimmy Wales admitted were just of abysmal quality. And when something like that happens, they circle the wagons and they come in and they clean up the article and it happens really fast. The problem is that people don't realize that for every article they do that with, there could be hundreds of articles that they haven't noticed that someone started and are just sitting there that could have been vandalized like Siegenthaler's bio was.

More Newsmakers

[ta bu shi da yu]

Daniel's suggestions are flawed

While I appreciate Daniel's comments, his ideas about how to "fix" Wikipedia's problems are fundamentally flawed. I can think of several reasons why they won't work:<br /><br />1. Registering people with a valid email address. What exactly is a valid email address? Anyone can register with Gmail, Yahoo or Hotmail and not prove their identity, or at least it is very easy to provide false information. Making people register with an email address would not make it easier to find the identity of editors. Unless Daniel is seriously considering making people provide proof of identity on these mail services (which, knowing his concerns about privacy I fear is doubtful), I don't see how this solves anything.<br /><br />2. Associating IP addresses with usernames. This is an interesting idea, but again, fundamentally flawed. There are literally hundreds of open proxies on the Internet, with no records being kept of who used the service - in effect making the editor untracable if they so decided to use the proxy. We have had problems with proxies used by large ISPs, such as AOL. Wikipedia have had considerable problems with them, in relation to vandalism. Jimbo Wales has actually contacted several of the larger ISPs, and they were less than helpful in providing assistance.<br /><br />I would also point out to Daniel that while he says that if Brian Chase had registered a username he never would have been found, the fact remains that it was only by a sheer stroke of luck that his identity was determined. Companies do not normally host their web servers from home-user broadband accounts, and regardless it was only through Brian's honesty that he came forward and confessed to Mr Seigenthaler. <br /><br />3. Taking out all the biographies on living people is a less than helpful suggestion. This would mean that we would need to remove the biography on Mark Latham (a significant figure in Australian politics), John Howard (the Prime Minister of Australia), George W. Bush, Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair, etc. The wiki process works well because you can change articles directly, besides which, having the article in a sandbox merely moves slanderous material to a different spot: the sandbox.<br /><br />I am well aware that Daniel dislikes the biographies as they currently stands because he would like his own deleted permanently from Wikipedia. Daniel believes that we are violating his privacy. I personally feel that he is hypocritical as just the other day, he added my real name and general location to his hitlist of Wikipedia editors he does not like. He was also tricked into adding false details about a Wikipedia administrator (see <a class="jive-link-external" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Daniel_Brandt#Daniel_Brandt_hoaxed" target="_newWindow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Daniel_Brandt#Daniel_Brandt_hoaxed</a> for more details) - this has since been removed. Please do not get me wrong: I do not believe we have the right to slander anyone - in fact this is against our site policy of neutrality - and when we see this we will remove the material, and if necessary removed it from the edit history. <br /><br />4. Wikipedia keeps the IP addresses associated with users for a period of one month. If Daniel feels that we should keep them longer, then I suppose we could arrange to keep them longer. However, given that he dislikes such private information kept for long periods of time, I find this strange. I recall that it was Daniel who forced the CIA to stop storing cookies so that people couldn't be tracked. I was under the impression that he was concerned about privacy.<br /><br />5. On the whole Brian Chase business: I feel bad for the man that he no longer has a job. However, I would like to point out a few things:<br /><br />a. Brian was deliberately tracked down by Daniel. Wikipedia administrators did not do this, we would have allowed Mr Seigenthaler Sr to have asked for the records from the ISP through normal legal channels. While this may have been difficult, it is not impossible. I personally cannot condone vigilantism, which I feel this amounts to. <br /><br />b. Brian's name hit the papers. If someone typed his name into Google, then it most likely would have appeared somewhere near the top of the list in old archived blogs or news site articles. His notoriety was not the fault of Wikipedia, though we very much regret that the whole business happened. To say that we are keeping a permanent record and this will permanently damage Brian is somewhat absurd. After his name is forgotten, I hardly think that an interviewer will go to Wikipedia and type in Brian's name to see if we have any information on him. I also somehow doubt they will type his name into Google to do a background check...<br /><br />c. Lastly, I feel that Daniel is being somewhat premature about Brian anyway. We currently are discussing whether to have his article deleted via the Articles for Deletion process. Most people currently believe he is not notable enough to be kept. It is quite possible that by the time anyone reads this comment that his article will be deleted. <br /><br />Regards,<br />Ta bu shi da yu<br />Wikipedia administrator

[WDS2]

Evolution and Creationism and etc.

So, Chris, what are you going to do when some creationists register themselves and start deleting and modifying every article about evolution? How about if some of the flat earthers start in on articles about space and Earth?<br /><br />I seem to recall that during the last election there was a lot of trouble with people modifying articles on various political topics, too.<br /><br />If your answer is "it will be self correcting" then I call your bluff. Some groups will continue to do this sort of thing forever.<br /><br />If your answer is "we will ban them" then one of the fundamental premises of Wikipedia (that anyone can modify it) is false.<br /><br />And how can I use something like wikipedia as a source if by tomorrow all the data I used from it is gone or completely modified?

[laurels]

what makes Chase notable enough to warrant an "encyclopedia" entry?

Well, the votes are in - Wikipedia has decided to keep the page on Brian Chase. Because they're an encyclopedia and they've determined Chase is important and relevant enough to warrant an encyclopedia entry?<br /><br />No - because he's a vandal and they want to make his life a living - if you go and look, I think the quote is still there, and probably will remain there.<br /><br />If Wikipedia were an "encyclopedia", it wouldn't have entries on ordinary citizens who've ticked off Wikipedia admins.<br /><br />Quick: how many articles can be found in Britannica on non-notable persons who've publicly embarrassed Britannica and/or its editors? And what do those articles say? Are they NPOV?

[teraphim]

Google Threat to Livelihood

//I also somehow doubt they will type his name into Google to do a background check...//<br /><br />Less than a month ago I read an article in an HR magazine about how recruiters now regard a basic Google search as a standard tool to gather information on candidates. The increasing role of Google in hiring has also been brought up recently as a threat to discourage college students from using Facebook and similar networking systems.<br /><br />The problem is not so much lack of quality control on Wikipedia: there's a lack of quality control plaguing the media in general. It's almost impossible for private citizens to get corrections from the press - and reporters themselves don't even understand the big deal since they see their medium as ephemeral. Moreover, increasing pressure on the media to woo back their readers has led to a quest after sensational stories. And when those stories don't exist, the media just makes the story up by creatively editing clips with new questions. One news outlet will copy content from another, and the falsehood spreads. Even if there is a correction, there's nothing to stop the original bad article from coming up first on Google.<br /><br />In the Wikipedia case, a private citizen's privacy was invaded, and there's no taking it back. He WILL be Googled by other people and this information will be online forever. This is a situation that will affect more and more people, and anger will mount as their public participation, even unwanted public participation in the form of being "outed", will be used to screen them out of job interviews.<br /><br />I'm a fan of Wikipedia's and I think their stance is generally right in dealing with this case, but pretending that a private citizen won't be harmed by his sudden Google presence is *crazy*. It makes Wikipedia look sly and disingenious to pretend this isn't a problem.

[Earl Benser]

Wikipedia is flawed

Whatever Wikipedia wanted to be, it is nothing more than an <br />unstable compilation of opinions with not very much verification. <br />As such, Wikipedia is interesting but not definitive in any way. It <br />may be a point to begin research, but for any serious research, It <br />certainly is nowhere near adequate. Accuracy in any Wiipedia <br />article is too much of an accident. True, many articles are <br />accurate.... right now. But you cannot tell which ones, nor can <br />you tell which ones will be accurate tomorrow.<br /><br />So, for those who are enamoured of Wikipedia, it's all yours. Do <br />with it as you will. Just don't ever quote it to me as proof of <br />anything.

[katamari]

As I said in past CNet Wikipedia articles...

...I couldn't agree more. :-)

[anarchyreigns]

Are you still talking?

"Just don't ever quote it to me as proof of anything."<br /><br />Yeah, uh huh. Just don't put a joke on their either.<br /><br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/breaking_news/13408982.htm" target="_newWindow">http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/breaking_news/13408982.htm</a><br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source/?p=525" target="_newWindow">http://blogs.zdnet.com/open-source/?p=525</a><br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2005-12-14-nature-wiki_x.htm" target="_newWindow">http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2005-12-14-nature-wiki_x.htm</a>

[Thunder Johny]

unstable compilation

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[rhecken]

Wikipedia's future

I enjoyed reading Mr. Terdiman's article. It brought to light <br />some of the serious limitations in regard to the veracity behind <br />its articles. In fact, it is important to recognize the diverse <br />categories that are open for manipulation by complete <br />strangers, who could be pranksters or what would be much <br />worse, pseudo-experts. Biographies are obviously among the <br />more sensitive category. However, having been a frequent user <br />of this free encyclopedia (and other similar services) I firmly <br />believe that W. needs to institute a hierachy of review boards for <br />all and any item/category published in order to regain and <br />solidify their credibilty. These review boards could be structured <br />around volunteers that have been "accredited" by peers in their <br />respective fields. Besides, each author must be a registered user <br />who has a verifyable and verified address and a personal profile <br />on record that would entitle them to publish their contribution. <br />Everything less than these minimum standards will make the <br />good intentions of the founders of W. useless for anybody who <br />seeks factual information.<br />Rudolf Hecken

[DMonniaux]

Nature does not agree with your opinion

A recent study by the prestigious scientific journal Nature actually showed that on a selection of topics on science and the history of science, Wikipedia was not substantially more inexact than Britannica (which many people consider as a reference encyclopedia), and contained as many gross inaccuracies.<br /><br />Reviewers rather pointed out bad structure and uneven writing in articles rather than inaccuracies.<br /><br />It is, however, possible that articles on political, religious and societal topics are not up to the same level of quality. Nature interviewed people who said that it was difficult to work on scientific articles on issues where many non-scientists have opinionated views, such as global warming.<br /><br />In any case, this study calls into question the various blanket condemnations of Wikipedia one hear in the press here and there. (Incidentally, the non-specialized press is a horrible source for scientific facts; yet, many people apparently get their informations from it.)

[Earl Benser]

But, six months from now.....

... Britannica will still say the same thing. Errors, if any, are locked <br />in until the next edition. <br /><br />No one knows what Wikipedia will say about any subject <br />six moinths from now. Old error may get changes. New errors will <br />be entered. Old biases may be eliminated, and new biases may be <br />introduced. One never can tell. And therein lies the fallacy of the <br />Wikipedia concept.

[OneWithTech]

You Got Lucky With the IP

You know you got lucky using the posted IP address of this <br />persons post. If he really didn't want to be known he could have <br />easily spoofed his IP address or used any of the various online <br />services that do it for you for free.<br /><br />So the fact that you tracked down this dud was PURE LUCK! <br />Track down somebody with a spoofed IP address and lets see <br />how far you get!<br /><br />Second. Who the HELL are YOU to think you can just track <br />somebody down and then continue to press a subject that's <br />really none of your business.<br /><br />Wikipedia as a service is responsible for it's articles, not you <br />acting as an evangelist. So your act has basically trashed the <br />ideas' behind animosity which in turn forced this kid to give up <br />his beliefs in turn of proving your own.<br /><br />Once again, you just got plain lucky when you tracked this <br />person down. Wikipedia as a service to the WWW is obviously <br />flawed and probably shouldn't be matched against the wit's of <br />Google. <br /><br />There services are not that similar at ALL. So a comparison is not <br />valid in this case. Google has proven itself through time and trial <br />to be of a superior service for what it attends to.<br /><br />~Justin

[anarchyreigns]

I agree, Brandt is a gadlfy loser!

You're a loser Brandt.

[laurels]

...but Wikipedia is NOT responsible

If Wikipedia had taken responsibility, Brandt wouldn't have had the opportunity to.

[M C]

Great humor piece...

...but it's all summed up here:<br /><br />"We still didn't know Brian's name at that point, but the very next day some guy named Brian Chase walks into Seigenthaler's offices at Vanderbilt University and delivers the confessional letter."<br /><br />In other words, Brian Chase "unmasked" himself, and now we're left with a big profile on the paranoid "watchdog" guy. <br /><br />Yay journalism.

Wikipedia is Great for Technical and Non-Controversial Articles

but you really don't want to read about Creationism there. . .

[anarchyreigns]

You don't really want to read about....

You don't really want to read about creationism anywhere. ;)

[chassoto--2008]

I agree that the suggestions ITA are flawed

However, the simple reason is because Wikipedia is flawed. It lacks <br />the editorial process, which is fundamental to the development of <br />knowledge in a peer reviewed world of scholarship.<br /><br />But I guess for "the internet," it's fine :)

[ta bu shi da yu]

Perhaps.

However, Wikipedia is a great source of general information. It has never pretended to be a scholarly peer reviewed journal! IMO, your argument is sort of like saying that news.com is inherintly flawed because it does not have a peer review mechanism. <br /><br />TBSDY

[Thunder Johny]

editorial process

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[ta bu shi da yu]

No.

Edit histories have been deleted, and article edit histories have been changed. This, however, is outside the norm. Firstly, John Seigenthaler Sr's article has several deleted edit histories. This is because he requested it - I'm perhaps wondering if you believe that we should not have done this? If so, why? <br /><br />As for editing the revisions in the database: this is not a regular practice. Again, it is done to remove defamatory material. And again I ask whether you believe that we should not do this? <br /><br />TBSDY

[atomas123]

that is to say no one should believe everything they read

no one should beleieve everything they read on the internet or any other information media. even news paper, tv, etc. have been erroneous at one time or another. Information can be manipulated be it by pranksters, simple human error or even for political reasons.<br />when I do research I use more than one source. everyone should do the same.

[Earl Benser]

No argument.....

... especially when one begins with an unstable collection of some <br />facts and some opinions like Wikipedia. There are just too many <br />reputable sources available to bother with Wikipedia. And still, <br />verify, verify, verify..................

[JonathanGCohen]

Footnotes

Am I the only one who thinks Wikipedia should encourage the use of footnotes to external sources in its articles? The open contributor model has significant merit, but articles produced under it lack total authority because of the possibility for vandalism, inaccuracies, poor grammar, and disjointed structure. As all information is derivative from other sources, I hope the powers that be at Wikipedia will adopt the philosophy that it can not be trusted on its own as a stand alone encyclopedic record. Wikipedia's definitive value is far greater as a conduit to knowledgeable authority than as a purveyor of it.<br /><br /><br />-Jonathan<br /><a class="jive-link-external" href="http://philoneist.com" target="_newWindow">http://philoneist.com</a>

[Xirphoid]

Showing someone's IP Address / email publicly is bad taste

Haven't you (this guy suggestiong changes to Wiki) EVER HEARD of things such as DoS attacks, or prank calls / telemarketing?<br /><br />Making someone's IP / email address is as bad as posting someone's name, address, and phone number on the Internet publicly so everyone can know / get harrassed, etc.<br /><br />It's basically a matter of PRIVACY! Anyways, who gave this guy the right to go snooping into someone's IP Address without thier permission?<br /><br />Do you want ME to call your house and read your bank account, or credit card information back to you over the phone? I wouldn't think so.

[arluthier]

SPAMMER!!!

Good point on the IP adress thing... on the bad taste topic:<br /><br />"...sending a phony e-mail, I mean an e-mail under a phony name, phony account..."<br /><br />that is called SPAMMING... and if you did it from certain service providers, it is against usage agreements... and even ILLEGAL in certain states!<br /><br />Maybe someone with time on their hands could investigate this guy and find out how to make his life a hassle as he has done others.

[Thunder Johny]

PRIVACY!

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