Wikipedia talk:Harassment: Difference between revisions

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WP:DOX explicitly covers “still-existing, self-disclosed posted information”, and also covers redacted or oversighted information. It does not seem to explicitly cover personal information that was self-disclosed on Wikipedia, then promptly deleted, but not redacted or oversighted, and which is still visible in the page history. Is such deleted information considered to be still-existing, or would raising it (in a sock puppet investigation, for example) be considered to be outing? Nurg (talk) 23:27, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

If you go down to the subsection on “Exceptions”, point number 2, it says: If individuals have identified themselves without redacting or having it oversighted, such information can be used for discussions of conflict of interest (COI) in appropriate forums. So referring to it, with a diff, is generally not going to be treated as a policy violation. However, common sense should also be used, and it may still be a better idea to communicate such information privately, depending on the context and circumstances. —Tryptofish (talk) 18:45, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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Remove “(for example, where Wikipedians know each other off-site and may inadvertently post personal information, such as using the other person’s real name in discussions)” because this is WP:BEANS as they encourage people to post real name if known in discussions as they wont get blocked but still may get other sanctions such as iban for that violation. 49.179.69.111 (talk) 01:30, 26 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Referring to still-existing, self-disclosed posted information is not considered outing, and so the failure of an editor to have the information redacted in a timely manner may remove it from protection by this policy. I assume that the standard procedure for accidental disclosure by a friend of the editor in question is the same: quietly email a couple admins to revdel the outing, preferably sent by the editor themselves. However, if another guy picks up the slip-up and starts routinely referring to the user by their real name, that is at the very least going to be frowned upon and most, including me, will see that as a form of harassment, even if technically it’s not exactly doxxing. The rules are not set in stone and if you intentionally behave like an asshole and try to lawyer your way through policies and guidelines, chances are you are gonna get sanctioned. While I would want for most policies and guidelines to be shorter, and in fact I started a compilation effort to make this goal happen, I do not see this passage as offending or a loophole. So  Not done but I’m not closing this edit request so that others can take a look – editing policies generally requires a bit of discussion. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 10:30, 26 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

 Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{Edit semi-protected}} template. —Ferien (talk) 17:27, 26 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

For context, see this comment by an arb; recently there have been a lot of cases involving off-site canvassing or advocacy, which have led to ArbCom blocks; two people in ArbCom case either received sanctions at least partially affected by such offsite evidence, or had in the past. At least one comment on that case was redacted (the admin doing so said that they didn’t think it should qualify as outing, but that it did.) The question of precisely what offsite stuff can lead to sanctions here is itself controversial (and ought to be discussed elsewhere), but it is clear that at least some stuff is leading to sanctions and that the OUTING policy is making it difficult to discuss or enforce. Therefore, I propose a limited exception to OUTING.

• Discussion of an off-wiki account is not considered OUTING, provided both of the following apply:
  • The account does not contain, and knowledge of it cannot reasonably be used to obtain, any other category of personal information.
  • The account’s primary purpose is for canvassing, advocacy, or discussion directly related to Wikipedia.

The intent is to establish a reasonable balance of potential harm vs. reasonable cause; the first point establishes that the risk of harm is low, and the second point establishes that there’s a reasonable cause for discussion. Some people might reasonably disagree over whether the things listed in the second point should lead to sanctions, but it is clear that they sometimes do; the reason why it goes a bit beyond just canvassing is because otherwise people might argue “ah, yes, I ran a blog saying that everything in this topic area is wrong and biased, but I didn’t explicitly tell people to edit.” The criteria needs to be clear-cut for reasons I think are obvious. The second bullet point could perhaps be a bit more permissive than “primary purpose”, but the intent is to avoid a situation where an account is outed for one or two posts – the intent is an account whose focus is so overwhelming that it raises WP:NOTHERE or WP:TEND concerns or something similar. —Aquillion (talk) 16:55, 1 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I support this. Seems a reasonable change that can help tackle canvassing issues but also providing some safeguards against outing private information by including primary purpose is canvasing and that the account has no private info on it in the proposal. GothicGolem29 (GothicGolem29 Talk) 17:00, 1 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]