[WikiEN-l] Classified information in Wikipedia

Fri Apr 1 17:27:57 UTC 2005

Fred Bauder wrote:

>Here's an example of a minor secret which I would never divulge or publish:
>
>I used to work for a company which had radio communications with a central
>dispatcher. We had a secret word which if used alerted the dispatcher that
>there was a serious problem. It was a pretty nifty system and as far as I
>know, none of the thousands of people who ever worked for that company ever
>let that secret out.
>  
>
The fact that there _is_ such a system wouldn't be a significant secret. 
Many documentaries about airplane hijackings mention that pilots have 
subtle ways of letting air traffic control know they're under duress, 
for example, and sometimes even mention specifics. Smart criminals would 
deduce the possibility for themselves and dumb ones probably won't be 
reading Wikipedia before pulling their heists anyway.

However, the secret code word itself wouldn't be included in Wikipedia 
unless it was verifiable using external sources, in which case the 
secret would have already been ruined anyway. Existing "verifiability" 
and "no original research" policies would seem to already prohibit the 
posting of any secrets that aren't already blown, so I doubt any sort of 
specialized policy on secrets will ever be necessary.