Mediaboss Marketing

Image from the Wikipedia page of the San Diego Police Department.

A San Diego Police Department dispatcher and anonymous Wikipedia users have edited or deleted paragraphs from the misconduct section of the police departments Wikipedia page five times since January 2014.

One of the Wikipedia users told U-T Watchdog he made the changes because individual cases were wrongly used to smear the whole department, or because of inaccuracies.

The anonymous edits were made through Internet connections owned by the City of San Diego and assigned to the police department, as recently as this January.

The edits, which eliminated references to negative information, came as the police force faced several scandals over officer misconduct a pattern that resulted in top brass requesting a federal review that was released today.

Wikipedia is a free online encyclopedia that is written and edited by volunteers. Its mission is to produce a neutral, reliably sourced encyclopedia.

The website discourages conflicts of interest that could undermine the sites credibility, including content changes that advance the interests of a users employer over the interest of readers.

Edits by the San Diego Police Department about something that pertains to their work would generally be considered a conflict of interest by the Wikipedia community, said Juliet Barbara, senior communications manager for the Wikimedia Foundation, the San Francisco nonprofit group that runs Wikipedia.

U-T Watchdog also asked police officials whether the use of department technology to make Wikipedia edits might violate policies on communications or use of equipment. Lt. Scott Wahl responded:

This Wikipedia page in not an SDPD or City sponsored website. The editing of content found on the Wikipedia page regarding the San Diego Police Department is not, nor has it ever been, assigned to any Police Department Personnel. Because Wikipedia is 'based on a model of openly editable content,' the department has no control over information displayed on the website, including any edits that may be made by internet users. We appreciate you bringing this to our attention. We will look into it as appropriate.

View post:
Wikipedia edits came from within SDPD