This is generally a straightforward decision per Commons:Photographs of
identifiable people. If the photos were taken in a private place,
consent is required. If the photos were taken in a public place, consent
is not required (with exceptions for some countries). What was the
justification for not following the Photographs of identifiable people
guideline?
Ryan Kaldari
On 3/10/12 8:03 PM, Andreas Kolbe wrote:
Last year, the Wikimedia Foundation Board published
the following
Resolution:
---o0o---
The Wikimedia Foundation Board affirms the value of freely licensed
content, and we pay special attention to the provenance of this
content. We also value the right to privacy, for our editors and
readers as well as on our projects. Policies of notability have been
crafted on the projects to limit unbalanced coverage of subjects, and
we have affirmed the need to take into account human dignity and
respect for personal privacy when publishing biographies of living
persons.
However, these concerns are not always taken into account with regards
to media, including photographs and videos, which may be released
under a free license although they portray identifiable living persons
in a private place or situation without permission. We feel that it is
important and ethical to obtain subject consent for the use of such
media, in line with our special mission as an educational and free
project.*We feel that seeking consent from an image's subject is
especially important in light of the proliferation of uploaded
photographs from other sources, such as Flickr, where provenance is
difficult to trace and subject consent difficult to verify.*
In alignment with these principles, the Wikimedia Foundation Board of
Trustees urges the global Wikimedia community to:
* Strengthen and enforce the current Commons guideline on
photographs of identifiable people
<http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Photographs_of_identifiable_people> with
the goal of requiring evidence of consent from the subject of
media, including photographs and videos, when so required under
the guideline. The evidence of consent would usually consist of
an affirmation from the uploader of the media, and such consent
would usually be required from identifiable subjects in a
photograph or video taken in a private place. This guideline has
been longstanding, though it has not been applied consistently.
* Ensure that all projects that host media have policies in place
regarding the treatment of images of identifiable living people
in private situations.
* Treat any person who has a complaint about images of themselves
hosted on our projects with patience, kindness, and respect, and
encourage others to do the same.
Approved 10-0.
---o0o---
Now, I am aware of a particular set of photographs on Commons, taken
in a private situation. They were taken from Flickr by an anonymous
contributor and uploaded to Commons. The images are no longer
available on Flickr, having been removed long ago.
Over the past year, the photographer has requested several times via
OTRS that Commons delete these images. He said that the subjects could
not understand how these images of them ended up on Commons, and were
aghast to find them there. They were never meant to be released publicly.
According to the deletion discussions, OTRS verified that the person
making the request was indeed the owner of the Flickr account.
Yet Commons administrators have consistently, through half a dozen
deletion discussions, refused to delete the images, disregarding the
objections of isolated editors who said that hosting the images in the
clear absence of subject consent runs counter to policy. Closing
admins' argument has been that licenses once granted cannot be revoked.
Yet according to the above resolution, Commons should not be hosting
these images. Not only was consent not obtained – an endemic situation
– the images are kept even though consent has been expressly denied.
Why are these images still on the Wikimedia Foundation server?
I am happy to pass further details on to any WMF staff, steward or
Commons bureaucrat who is willing and able to review the deletion
requests and OTRS communications, and remove the images permanently.
Andreas
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