The Signpost: 1 December 2018

Administrators' newsletter – December 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2018).

 

  Administrator changes

  Al Ameer sonRandykittySpartaz
  BosonDaniel J. LeivickEfeEsanchez7587Fred BauderGarzoMartijn HoekstraOrangemike

  Interface administrator changes

 Deryck Chan

  Guideline and policy news

  • Following a request for comment, the Mediation Committee is now closed and will no longer be accepting case requests.
  • A request for comment is in progress to determine whether members of the Bot Approvals Group should satisfy activity requirements in order to remain in that role.
  • A request for comment is in progress regarding whether to change the administrator inactivity policy, such that administrators "who have made no logged administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped". Currently, the policy states that administrators "who have made neither edits nor administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped".
  • A proposal has been made to temporarily restrict editing of the Main Page to interface administrators in order to mitigate the impact of compromised accounts.

  Technical news

  Arbitration

  Miscellaneous

  • In late November, an attacker compromised multiple accounts, including at least four administrator accounts, and used them to vandalize Wikipedia. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately. Sharing the same password across multiple websites makes your account vulnerable, especially if your password was used on a website that suffered a data breach. As these incidents have shown, these concerns are not pure fantasies.
  • Wikipedia policy requires administrators to have strong passwords. To further reinforce security, administrators should also consider enabling two-factor authentication. A committed identity can be used to verify that you are the true account owner in the event that your account is compromised and/or you are unable to log in.

  Obituaries


Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:36, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

DS Appeal

Thank you for contacting me regarding my appeal. I have an issue however and wish to raise it with you:

The objections given by several editors contained references to an inability to cope with technical aspects of the site. Also reference was made to my not editing enough articles. In addition my previous incarnations were used against me even though they've been declared for 6 + years and are clearly visible on my home page. Lord Roem says he wants to see more "good behaviour" - is five years + not trouble free enough for him?

I've made over 500 edits in the last five years but that's irrelevant because Wikipedia sets no criteria. Had I only made one edit, in theory I should be treated the same as someone who's done 5000. Similarly, although I refute entirely the accusation that I am unable to master technical aspects of the Wiki, having done so on hundreds of occasions in the past; as the banning editor does Sandstein have the right to comment?

I've researched the criteria for joining Wikipedia and I can find nothing which relates to these "special skills" which some editors are using as a reason to oppose the lifting of my topic ban.

Given what I've pointed out I would respectfully suggest I have been unfairly judged. I've not taken it badly but do have strong views about it (obviously) so would you be kind enough to suggest my next step because I sincerely feel five years in the sin bin is enough. SonofSetanta (talk) 14:19, 12 December 2018 (UTC)

The thing is, to have an editing restriction removed, you are supposed to show that you understand what you did wrong and to show that, if the sanction is lifted, you will not repeat the same mistakes that led to its imposition in the first place. The only way for us to evaluate whether you are likely to edit disruptively, once the restriction is lifted, is to examine your track record after the sanction was imposed. In this case, unfortunately, you made too few edits for us to feel comfortable lifting the editing restriction.

That said, if you want, you may appeal at WP:AN and/or at WP:ARCA (the relevant policy is at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions#Appeals and modifications). Salvio Let's talk about it! 11:02, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for your advice. I firmly believe that 500 trouble free edits is more than enough to show I understand what I did wrong. I also made it very clear I had no plans to return to editing Troubles related articles. Notwithstanding that I will take your advice although not right away as I have other projects on. SonofSetanta (talk) 17:15, 13 December 2018 (UTC)

Indefinite block on MarkBernstein

Hey, I don't see anything so terribly concerning regarding MB that requires an indefinite block less than 24 hours after the report. It's a constructive talk page edit, on a page where the admin who applied the sanction said editing would not be a topic ban (see diff by Mr. Ernie), and a clear mea culpa from the accused. MB had a lot of trouble 1 year ago - that's twice the timeframe we generally give a 'standard offer' on, and the conduct here is not horrifying in any way proportionate to anything like what you've imposed. Would you consider leaving it open to discussion a bit longer? PeterTheFourth (talk) 22:05, 21 December 2018 (UTC)

It was a clear-cut topic ban violation committed, by a user with a history of violating his restriction, basically as soon as the previous block for violating his topic ban expired, so it's probably as cut and dried a case as you can get; I could see no point in leaving the thread open any longer, so I'm not going to reopen the discussion. Salvio Let's talk about it! 22:32, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
The admin who imposed the ban clearly said that edits to MY were not a violation of the topic ban. Is that your final answer? PeterTheFourth (talk) 22:40, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
Aye. Salvio Let's talk about it! 22:45, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
FYI. PeterTheFourth (talk) 23:29, 21 December 2018 (UTC)

Yo Ho Ho

ϢereSpielChequers 21:34, 22 December 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 December 2018

FkpCascais

You closed the AE enforcement request against FkpCascais without addressing the intentional baiting into a violation of the TBAN by an IP editor. For clarity I am referring to this: Here -> here -> here and then here. At the bare minimum I would expect a warning for this kind of behaviour. Mr rnddude (talk) 22:18, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

That is very poor form indeed! I hadn't noticed. I'll leave a stern warning, thanks for drawing my attention to it. Salvio Let's talk about it! 22:58, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for handling it. Mr rnddude (talk) 23:24, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2018).

  Guideline and policy news

  1. G14 (new): Disambiguation pages that disambiguate only zero or one existing pages are now covered under the new G14 criterion (discussion). This is {{db-disambig}}; the text is unchanged and candidates may be found in Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as unnecessary disambiguation pages.
  2. R4 (new): Redirects in the file namespace (and no file links) that have the same name as a file or redirect at Commons are now covered under the new R4 criterion (discussion). This is {{db-redircom}}; the text is unchanged.
  3. G13 (expanded): Userspace drafts containing only the default Article Wizard text are now covered under G13 along with other drafts (discussion). Such blank drafts are now eligible after six months rather than one year, and taggers continue to use {{db-blankdraft}}.

  Technical news

  • Starting on December 13, the Wikimedia Foundation security team implemented new password policy and requirements. Privileged accounts (administrators, bureaucrats, checkusers, oversighters, interface administrators, bots, edit filter managers/helpers, template editors, et al.) must have a password at least 10 characters in length. All accounts must have a password:
  1. At least 8 characters in length
  2. Not in the 100,000 most popular passwords (defined by the Password Blacklist library)
  3. Different from their username
User accounts not meeting these requirements will be prompted to update their password accordingly. More information is available on MediaWiki.org.
  • Blocked administrators may now block the administrator that blocked them. This was done to mitigate the possibility that a compromised administrator account would block all other active administrators, complementing the removal of the ability to unblock oneself outside of self-imposed blocks. A request for comment is currently in progress to determine whether the blocking policy should be updated regarding this change.
  • {{Copyvio-revdel}} now has a link to open the history with the RevDel checkboxes already filled in.

  Arbitration

  Miscellaneous

  • Accounts continue to be compromised on a regular basis. Evidence shows this is entirely due to the accounts having the same password that was used on another website that suffered a data breach. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately.
  • Around 22% of admins have enabled two-factor authentication, up from 20% in June 2018. If you haven't already enabled it, please consider doing so. Regardless of whether you use 2FA, please practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:39, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

You've got mail!

 
Hello, Salvio giuliano. Please check your email; you've got mail!
Message added 18:12, 4 January 2019 (UTC). It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.

TheSandDoctor Talk 18:12, 4 January 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 January 2019

Administrators' newsletter – February 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2019).

 

  Administrator changes

  EnterpriseyJJMC89
  BorgQueen
  Harro5Jenks24GraftR. Baley

  Interface administrator changes

 Enterprisey

  Guideline and policy news

  • A request for comment is currently open to reevaluate the activity requirements for administrators.
  • Administrators who are blocked have the technical ability to block the administrator who blocked their own account. A recent request for comment has amended the blocking policy to clarify that this ability should only be used in exceptional circumstances, such as account compromises, where there is a clear and immediate need.
  • A request for comment closed with a consensus in favor of deprecating The Sun as a permissible reference, and creating an edit filter to warn users who attempt to cite it.

  Technical news

  • A discussion regarding an overhaul of the format and appearance of Wikipedia:Requests for page protection is in progress (permalink). The proposed changes will make it easier to create requests for those who are not using Twinkle. The workflow for administrators at this venue will largely be unchanged. Additionally, there are plans to archive requests similar to how it is done at WP:PERM, where historical records are kept so that prior requests can more easily be searched for.

  Miscellaneous

  • Voting in the 2019 Steward elections will begin on 08 February 2019, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 28 February 2019, 13:59 (UTC). The confirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automatically check your eligibility to vote.
  • A new IRC bot is available that allows you to subscribe to notifications when specific filters are tripped. This requires that your IRC handle be identified.

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:15, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 February 2019

Administrators' newsletter – March 2019

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2019).

  Guideline and policy news

  Technical news

  • A new tool is available to help determine if a given IP is an open proxy/VPN/webhost/compromised host.

  Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee announced two new OTRS queues. Both are meant solely for cases involving private information; other cases will continue to be handled at the appropriate venues (e.g., WP:COIN or WP:SPI).
    • paid-en-wp wikipedia.org has been set up to receive private evidence related to abusive paid editing.
    • checkuser-en-wp wikipedia.org has been set up to receive private requests for CheckUser. For instance, requests for IP block exemption for anonymous proxy editing should now be sent to this address instead of the functionaries-en list.

  Miscellaneous


Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:13, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Templates for discussion

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Templates for discussion. Legobot (talk) 04:48, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Templates for discussion

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Templates for discussion. Legobot (talk) 04:32, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 March 2019