Brazilian Presidential Palace will prohibit editing of Wikipedia on its network.
This is the first measure adopted in response to the disclosure that computers connected to the Presidential network accessed Wikipedia to alter the profiles of journalists Miriam Leitão and Carlos Alberto Sardenberg, including critical comments about them; through an official statement, the government said that it has no way of knowing exactly who made the changes, since the browsing history of the Presidential machines was archived (until July 2014) for only 6 months. The vandalism occurred in 2013.
247 - The Presidential Palace will block access to the Wikipedia editing page from the Presidency's internet network. This is the first measure adopted in response to the disclosure that computers connected to the Presidency's network accessed Wikipedia to alter the profiles of journalists Miriam Leitão and Carlos Alberto Sardenberg, including critical comments about them.
In an official statement, the government said it has no way of knowing exactly who made the alterations, as the browsing history of the Presidential computers was only archived (until July 2014) for 6 months. The vandalism occurred in 2013.
According to Minister Gilberto Carvalho, from the General Secretariat of the Presidency, the case is "abominable," and he promised an investigation to punish those responsible. "It would not be our intention to take any action of this kind. The IP address of the Presidential Palace is used by many people; we will conduct an investigation to locate which machine this nonsense originated from. This type of action is abominable. We will do everything to punish them severely. This is not acceptable in a democracy," he stated.
The Federal District Attorney's Office will analyze the changes. Based on the evaluation, the prosecutors will decide whether or not to open any proceedings to investigate the case.