Exposed: guess who has been polishing
their Wikipedia entries?
August 15, 2007
Source: Times Online
No hiding place after a new website shows that a rash of companies are editing entries on the world's most popular online reference work
Rhys Blakely
A new website built by an American technology student has uncovered the lengths that companies apparently go to improve their public image by tweaking their entries on Wikipedia,[1] the online encyclopaedia that - famously - "anyone can edit".
The WikiScanner [2] site, developed by Virgil Griffith, a researcher at the California Institute of Technology, reveals changes to the online encyclopaedia by linking edits back to the computers from which they emanate using each computer's unique IP address.
Mr Griffith, 24, says he created the site [3] "to create minor public relations disasters for companies and organisations I dislike" - a mission he may well have succeeded in.
Among those he alleges have been updating their entries are Wal-Mart, the world's largest grocer, AstraZeneca, the drugs giant, Britain's Labour Party, the CIA and the Vatican.
In one example he gives, a computer linked to an IP address registered to the Dow Chemical company is seen to have deleted a passage [4] on the Bhopal chemical disaster of 1984, which occurred at a plant operated by Union Carbide, now a wholly-owned Dow subsidiary.
WikiScanner cannot identify the individuals altering Wikipedia articles. It can show only that an edit was made by a person with access to an organisation's network.
"Technically, we don't know whether it came from an agent of that company, however, we do know that edit came from someone with access to their network," Mr Griffith says on his site.
A slew of other companies' computers are also shown to have been used to polish Wikipedia entries.
ExxonMobil, the US oil giant, made sweeping changes [5] to an entry on the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989. A claim that the company "has not yet paid the $5 billion in spill damages it owes to the 32,000 Alaskan fishermen" is deleted and replaced with references to the funds the company has paid out.
A web surfer using a machine on Wal-Mart's network has amended a passage [6] on the rates that the retailer pays its employees - to the benefit of the world's largest retailer.
A computer registered to Disney, the media giant, was used to delete a reference [7] to criticism of the use of Digital Rights Management software, used by the group to safeguard digital media from piracy.
According to other Wikipedia pages laid bare by the Wikiscanner site, references to claims that Seroquel, a drug developed by AstraZeneca, which allegedly made teenagers "more likely to think about harming or killing themselves" were deleted by a user of a computer registered to the drug company. [8]
In May the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposed that makers of all antidepressant medications - including Seroquel - update labeling to include warnings over increased risks of suicidal thinking and behavior in young adults during early treatment. The proposed warnings would emphasise that other serious psychiatric disorders are themselves the most important causes of suicide.
He told Times Online in an interview this afternoon that he is likely to next turn his attention to the "treasure trove of information that people give away" on social networking sites such as Facebook and Bebo.
"I think you could do some very interesting things there - you have huge amounts of information openly available; it's not like you have to do anything naughty," he said.
Meanwhile, his efforts so far have also uncovered amendments made from computers linked to the CIA, which were used to edit entries including the biographies of the former US presidents Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon.
Individuals using computers registered to the Vatican have amended entries on Roman Catholic saints and Gerry Adams, the leader of Sinn Fein.
A computer linked to the Church of Scientology's network was used to delete references to links [9] between it and a group dubbed the "Cult Awareness Network".
In the political arena, a computer based at Labour's Millbank offices was used to edit out an unflattering reference to "careerist MPs" while a computer linked to the Democrats' headquarters was used to brand listeners of Rush Limbaugh, the conservative American radio host, "legally retarded".
A user of a BBC computer, meanwhile, edited George W Bush's middle name [10] from "Walker" to "Wanker".
Massaging Wikipedia entries has become a well-established phenomenon as the reach of the world's most popular online reference work has become apparent.
Last year the site was transformed into a political battleground in the US, with politicians' aides accused of "vandalising" entries on opposition figures.
The site, launched in 2001, started an inquiry after staff for Marty Meehan, a Democratic representative, admitted having "polished" his biography.
The partisan editors were traced through their computers' unique IP addresses - which were tracked back to Senate machines.
On several occasions Wikipedia had been used as a platform for negative propaganda, the site admitted at the time.
According to a report on Wikipedia's own news service, staff in the offices of Senator Joe Biden removed a paragraph concerning an alleged plagiarism scandal, as well as changing the section regarding a possible 2008 presidential campaign "to read very positively".
However, in a signal of how tempting it can be for interested parties to amend articles, Jimmy Wales, the Wikipedia founder, himself ran into controversy in 2005, when he admitted editing his own Wikipedia entry.
He said that such behaviour, though tempting, "was in bad taste".
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http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/media/article2264150.ece