User:Raidarr/Workspace/Privacy Policy

Template:Executivepolicy Last modified on 12/06/2024

WikiOasis has a handful of privacy nerds on staff who don't want to soak up more information than they have to any more than the privacy-conscious will want them to have it.

This policy covers all interactions with WikiOasis as a platform, its officially designated affiliates, and its constituent wikis, as understood through the Terms of Service.

1. The general summary

WikiOasis doesn't want to know your name, your address, your phone number, any of that, and in fact, we don't want you to post it on-wiki and we may suppress this information even if you volunteer it in some cases. Exceptions could apply for 'public' phone numbers and identities and as provided through your Preferences, but this is on a case by case basis and unless you're Jimbo Wales or someone of that notoriety, wiki editors generally do not apply here. Basically, we take doxxing quite seriously and we ask you to be careful about your online interactions.

We will not knowingly collect data from users under 13 years of age nor market service to them. If we know or strongly suspect you are under 13, we will terminate your account and remove what we can in the software about you. Parents are encouraged to contact us if their children are accessing the platform in violation of this; we will take care of it.

Edits, connection data (IP and so on), and account interactions are logged. Some of this is retained in your profile, for example, username, password, email if you provide it. It exists forever unless you submit a request to remove your account. Then we will use an extension to purge this data irrecoverably, however it will not affect edits on the wiki and interactions remain on-file accessible through CheckUser and possibly the abuse filter.

Edits are not hard deleted from WikiOasis per-wiki. At most they can be suppressed, and we only do this when unacceptable sensitive information is leaked or extreme content is posted. This information will then only be accessible by Executive Staff such as Stewards, Trust and Safety or Tech, not the local administration unless they also have this global access. Wikis themselves can be deleted, first through the interface and eventually hard deleted. CheckUser data also exists, and therefore is permanently made unavailable after wiki hard deletion as well.

CheckUser information is on file for a rolling six month period. This exists to investigate abuse, handled by Stewards and Trust and Safety. It is only used when these groups have strong reason to believe abuse is taking place, or in an exceptional case such as to help with account recovery.

WikiOasis reserves the right to privately log snippets of CheckUser and other publicly unavailable technical information if it experiences abuse for longer than the software is configured to record and provide. This is only done for severe cases like Long Term Abuse or to support legal investigations. This provision is an unfortunate result of abuse records on other platforms lasting for years, even decades to the inconvenience of the platforms handling the abuse. The assessment is done case by case and this notice may override even requests to delete accounts and all associated data. It is done strictly as necessary and oversight is run through Trust and Safety.

If there are any further questions, please consult the following sections that get in detail about different aspects, or contact WikiOasis for any clarification.

2. Logged out information

When you are not registered on WikiOasis, some interaction data is collected (usual internet connection stuff - IP, browser info, that sort of thing). If you are reading, this fact is known through private server-side logs that refresh 'every so often'. This is not examined or touched except when strictly necessary by the Tech Team.

If you interact with the interface however, such as login attempts or IP edits, this becomes known within the MediaWiki interface, and this knowledge could be retrieved as-needed by Stewards, Trust and Safety or the Tech Team.

Remember, if you do not have an account or do not edit while logged in, your IP will be permanently recorded! We can suppress this from public view and local administrators if it was an accident, but MediaWiki doesn't to a great job of preventing accidents. Please edit carefully if this is a concern to you.

3. Logged in information

This includes your username, password, other information you submit through Special:Preferences, and your email address. These can be purged with an account removal request.

Adding your email is not required unless you wish to request a wiki, you are a platform functionary of some sort, or you attempt to edit a wiki that requires email confirmation for whatever reason. You can control what emails are sent to you (notifications for a number of actions and events), and you control the ability of other users to email you. These emails do not expose your email to other users, unless you respond to the email in your email application.

4. Contributions

Making a contribution (generally, an edit or upload) through our platform is on record through the MediaWiki interface. Every contribution notes who added it (if you added a real name to your account this is part of it!), when it was added and what exactly you changed. Except for private wikis this information is available to the public, and this information is stored permanently. These contributions either associate with your account or your IP depending if you are logged in or out.

These cannot be purged by the platform completely unless the wiki is completely removed! Individual contributions may be suppressed as previously described. Bear in mind that third parties will scrape whatever is publicly available and the information may survive any effort we take to suppress it, be it through Google, the Internet Archive, etc...

5. Private wikis

The option exists for wikis to become private, which will limit almost all aspects of the wiki to that wiki's administration, those it invites, and senior WikiOasis functionaries (Stewards, Trust and Safety, Tech, strictly as needed or invited - we don't want to snoop people's stuff).

Keep in mind that local administrators can add or remove members at will, and any contributions you make to a private wiki you don't operate could be lost to you. Conversely, the wiki could be turned public with the touch of a button in the interface by the wiki's management. Finally, unless you are contacting us from an account that had access to the wiki already or was explicitly authorized in a way we can verify from someone who does, we cannot give you access to the wiki.

For example if you had one account that ran a private wiki and lost access to the account, and that was the only one that could access the wiki, we can't let you in until you verify ownership of that account. Please be careful.

Please report any breach of confidence (say, a steward interacting where they shouldn't on a private wiki with no clear policy enforcement basis or invitation) to WikiOasis Trust and Safety.

6. Cookies

WikiOasis serves 'cookies' to make stuff work better. These are not shared with third parties and they are not mandatory, although you might find account usage difficult if they are completely blocked. They are used in three ways:

• Accounts - a cookie exists for WikiOasis to know you're logged in.
• Analytics - anonymous usage information through mw:Extension:MatomoAnalytics. Can be opted out with browser "Do not Track" features.
• Preferences - remembering certain interactions, like dismissing site notices.

7. Sharing Information with Third Parties

With limited exception, information collected on WikiOasis stays on WikiOasis. However certain things may be rendered public, for example if wiki administrators share the summarized results of local analytics or the platform as a whole provides overall usage information in aggregate.

We share any other sensitive data under three circumstances.

• Legal necessity: we will cooperate with valid law enforcement requests in any way we can. We may also volunteer this information to make a report, for example hacking attempts.
• We may share the entirety of platform information to another party if that party is taking over WikiOasis ownership. It sure as hell won't be to Fandom but if this farm changes jurisdiction or ownership, that will apply.
• We may hire/authorize an outsider to perform technical or legal services and they may have limited sensitive access as-necessary. Our hosting platforms may access raw data in troubleshooting.

8. Wiki-specific privacy policy

Wikis can create their own privacy policies that cover other aspects. Remember that local wikis can access rather little information about you - revision histories, info from edits while logged out, they know your username, etc. But they do not have access to your password, CheckUser (restricted to global staff only), your email address, and other details. They have the right to solicit more than you want to provide, although they may reasonably turn on email confirmation or funnel memberships through a third party like discord if it's a more private community.

Wikis are discouraged from adding custom analytics in favor of using WikiOasis offered Matomo Analytics, a locally hosted, privacy-respecting yet powerful solution. Any member wikis that require more are encouraged to run it through WikiOasis. Any approved extra measures must be clearly expressed through a local privacy policy.

If a wiki is collecting information in violation of the law or collecting information outside the bounds of this policy or not disclosed locally, please cease interacting on that wiki immediately and contact WikiOasis Trust and Safety.

Major revisions

• December 6th, 2024: initial draft, inspired by but deviating heavily in structure from the Miraheze Privacy Policy