An Explanation

[Secura]

This thread is to inform you of a recent action taken by the administration team, in an effort to increase the transparency of staff activity and provide accountability for the decision.

It has always been the policy of the Org that, regardless of the intrusiveness of governments and corporations, this forum would ensure privacy remained sacred; if you wanted to talk to someone in confidence about your belief that Andres wears underpants on his head, shoves pencils up his nose and spouts "wibble" everywhere he goes, then you could do so without your discussion being revealed. It is not Org policy to check private messages unless unique circumstances demand it or a user has given permission to do so, the latter having happened a few times in the past.

Unfortunately, such unique circumstances arose when a permabanned member continued their attempts to circumvent said ban; over the course of this person's absence from the Org, staff have had to delete countless alt accounts and attempts to block IPs have been futile when the person simply moves to another IP or we're unable to block it because other Orgahs have visited from those locations too.

The latest attempt to circumvent the ban came in the form of the banned member assuming the active profile of a family member and continuing to post; while the staff had their suspicions and even reset the password. the perpetrator continued to use the account, even responding to our emails in a manner we just knew was not that of the original account owner. However we had lacked real proof and, after a lengthy staff discussion, the decision was made to read the latest private messages sent from the account, whereby absolute proof of the user's identity was discovered and the account was subsequently suspended.

While there is no great comfort in having to resort to such methods, I would readily advocate their use again if the same circumstances arose; this particular member in question is not welcome here anymore and the community is better off without them, and I would take any action that ensure their permanent ban remains just that.

It should be added that the family member in question can reactivate their account if and when they can confirm that both the account and the email address registered to it are no longer accessible by the permabanned member.

[Monk]

Absolutely disgraceful. There are no words to properly express my disappointment in staff.

[CBR]

It was IMO justified, so the staff has my support.

[caravel]

Hello,

I guess I'm back... for now (which is good or bad depending on how you look at it...), I was recently in touch with Andres which got me thinking about this old place a bit more again.

The key problem here is that private messaging has been violated which back in Tosa's time would never have happened. Personally I think that's disgraceful - but I think some respect here is deserved in that the admin have been transparent about this. Members need to ask: Will this happen again? Is it now too easy to just read a PM and find out who's who rather than spending weeks, months even years "investigating"... should you be investigating at all?

I would say that there are ways and means of exposing troublemakers, and I think I know who you're referring to, but this is the worst method imaginable and by the looks of things I think you already know that...

The way I see it - problem member, given too much attention, made to feel far too important, too many of "our best officers" on the job, etc... this fellow must feel like the typical bond villain by now...

Regards

caravel/asai/etc, etc, etc

[Monk]

It was IMO justified, so the staff has my support.

I'm pretty sure this is just about warman using his brother's account to continually shit up the forums. No need to be coy. In which case I have to disagree. Not in terms of banning warman, as i said, he causes enough problems to be beyond defense. However if staff suspected him using the account why not just ban the account until such a time that he can prove his innocence.

Guilty until proven innocent is a much lesser evil than breaking the mod/member privacy trust, which I doubt you'll ever get back after this. I don't disagree with the ban of the account, but the methods undertaken to do so are pretty laughable.

[TinCow]

Absolutely disgraceful. There are no words to properly express my disappointment in staff.

I understand your point of view, but I do not agree with it. I think the situation was handled entirely appropriately. This is not a blanket change in policy, it was simply an incredibly unusual circumstance involving a very specific member whose past behavior needs no elaboration. As it was, we were unsure whether the person had actively stolen the account or had appropriated it with the permission of the owner. We attempted to contact the true owner via email, and the response that we got back did not clarify the issue for us. I believe that determining the identity of the person using a potentially stolen account is important and is a very good reason for doing what was done.

In addition, I was the only person who read the PMs. I am probably the last person on this forum that needs to be informed of the importance of privacy. My job involves reading volumes of confidential personal and medical records on a daily basis, much of which is exceptionally sensitive and would be embarrassing if it became public. I would face felony charges and jail time if I were to even misplace the documents I work with, let alone publicize them. I would also lose my bar license. Then there's also the fact that the attorney-client privilege has been drilled into me as part of my legal brainwashing. I am very experienced with handling confidential information in a proper manner. I accessed only one account and only read PMs whose subject lines and dates made them appear relevant to the information search, and I only passed on those PMs which contained the information that was necessary to make the determinations that were needed.

I believe what was done was entirely appropriate and reasonable under the unusual circumstances that we were presented with, and I would advocate for them again in the future if the same situation arose.

[Monk]

Well that certainly eases the tension a bit, but not fully in my mind. I trust you, TC, I always have. I respect you immensely not only for who you are personally but for every ounce of energy you poured into this place despite that it was never required of you.

But not all of those who make up the staff on this site are as honorable as you. I'm not gonna sit here and name names who tell you who is on my naughty and nice lists, that'd just be melodramatic, silly, and overall pointless. Rather, this news now forces me into the unenviable position where I can never be quite sure of my privacy on this site, especially in that there are those on staff whom I find rather questionable. I do not trust every member of the staff on this site to act "honorably", and haven't for quite some time. This being in the open only makes that feeling all the more amplified. It's not a nice feeling and is a pointless addition of internet silliness into my life that I'd rather be without.

Given the general lethargy this has inspired I guess I'll just man up and not use the PM feature if it upsets me so much.

[Jolt]

I agree with the decision, given the unprecedented situation.

[johnhughthom]

Do you really see private messages on an internet forum as being that sacred, Monk? To me the "private" part is interpreted as "not public" rather than "100% private", I've always thought that there is a possibility of forum staff reading them in certain circumstances, and wouldn't really have a problem with it.

[a completely inoffensive name]

This is just sad.