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This page documents an independent counter policy on the English Wikipedia. The main Wikipedia policy on CheckUser is at (WP:CHECKUSER) and nothing here may override that policy, but it may circumvent it. |
On Wikipedia, CheckUser is a tool allowed to be used by a small number of users who are permitted to examine user IP information and other server log data under certain circumstances, for the purposes of protecting Wikipedia against actual and potential disruption and abuse. Checkuser itself simply produces log information for checking; it can require considerable skill and experience to investigate cases even with the tool.
Independent CheckUser (ICU) is a tool allowed to be used by anyone, on anyone, at anytime, for any reason. It runs counter to Checkuser. It was developed due to requesters routinely ignoring the right of users to have multiple accounts as long as those accounts did not violate other wikipedia policies. As such CheckUser is constantly abused by overuse. Due to the weight of the implications in assumed guilt a CheckUser allegation and investigation has it is too important to be run in secret, without notification, or with undocumented results based on a hidden scale. ICU is intended to be a tool that uses public information, provides public notification, public logging of usage, public results, and a public report on how it achieved its final conclusion. However its final conclusion is intended only as a summary statement an by itself should never be used as evidence of fault or non-fault.
ICU is intended to bypass privacy issues by bypassing the Arbitration Committee, who handle many privacy-related functions. There are no age or identification requirements for ICU.
Policy edit
The ICU feature is intended for use to prevent disruption, or investigate legitimate concerns of bad faith editing.
Grounds for checking edit
The tool is to be used to fight vandalism, to check for sockpuppet abuse, and to limit disruption of the project.
The tool can not be used for political control; to apply pressure on editors; or as a threat against another editor in a content dispute.
Note that alternative accounts are not forbidden, so long as they are not used in violation of the policies (for example, to double-vote or to increase the apparent support for any given position). (Also Note: No one pays attention to this part)
Notifying the account that is checked edit
Notification to the account that is checked is permitted but is not mandatory. If notification is not provided it will be assumed that the requester is a WP:Dick.
ICU and privacy policy edit
ICU accesses public information. There is no 'very delicate area' and as with anything no solution is ideal; the following cover some of the principles and common practices on English Wikipedia. If in doubt please ask an experienced CheckUser.
- ICUsers have a wide range of discretion to use their access.
- ICUsers may accept requests publicly or otherwise, as they see fit.
- Requests may be accepted on the basis of "fishing" - that is, requests by users without a good and specific cause. This is due to CheckUser policy that Checkusers, on their own cognisance they may however perform privately as part of their role, any checks within the bounds of CheckUser policy and in secret.
- Disclosure of ICU results is not subject to privacy policy.
IP information disclosure edit
It is not normally considered a breach of privacy policy to state that different named accounts are operated from the same IP or range if details of the range are not given, or if a generic description only is given (country, large ISP etc) that in no way is very likely to identify a specific person. It is undesirable to link an IP to a named account, since an IP is often much more tightly linked to a specific person. (This is often less so for larger IP ranges: the larger the range, the less obvious the connection will often be to any specific person.)
This can happen in several ways:
- A user is disruptive through multiple IPs, or a mixture of IPs and accounts. It is hard to block all of these (often on the same article) without obvious inference being drawn by onlookers.
- A user is disruptive on multiple accounts, and it is reasonably plausible they will create more accounts, requiring the blocking of the underlying IP range that these accounts are using.
Users who engage in problematic conduct to the point that requests for administrative action or blocking are raised and considered valid for ICU usage, and where ICU then determines that the user probably has engaged in such conduct, must expect that the protection of the project is given a somewhat higher priority compared to the protection of those who knowingly breach its policies on editorial conduct, if the two conflict or there is a problematic editing history.