The conflict that erupted between French intelligence authorities and the Wikimedia Foundation over its refusal to remove a "sensitive" Wikipedia page goes right to the heart of free expression, says Geoffrey Brigham, the foundation's general counsel. Decisions on takedown requests are based less on filing the right paperwork or adhering to a particular country's laws than on the Wikipedia community's principles.
Earlier this month, agents for France's top intelligence agency, the Direction Central du Renseignement Int�rieur, or DCRI, were accused of trying to force a Wikipedia volunteer to remove a Wikipedia page describing a French military radio relay station. The volunteer, a library curator, reportedly was threatened with jail unless he complied.
Before any of the bullying took place, the DCRI had gone the conventional route, contacting the Wikimedia Foundation, which is Wikipedia's parent organization. The Wikimedia Foundation declined to remove the material but said it would be happy to comply upon the receipt of proper legal documentation.
The saga had a few unintended consequences. For one thing, the French authority hoping to stymie the spread of information about the station ended up increasing traffic to the page 1,000-fold. The events also raised interesting questions about what, exactly, constitutes a legitimate Wikipedia takedown request. If a national security-related request from France -- which is not some backwater, totalitarian regime -- is not heeded, then what is? What makes a takedown request legitimate?
In this TechNewsWorld podcast, we talk with Geoffrey Brigham, the general counsel and board secretary for the Wikimedia Foundation, which hosts a number of projects, including Wikipedia. Brigham explains the logistics of a Wikipedia takedown request, what the criteria for legitimacy are, and how Wikipedia's linguistic expansion -- which invariably means a geographic expansion -- affects this process.
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