Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons

This page documents an English Wikipedia policy.

It describes a widely accepted standard that all editors should normally follow. Changes made to it should reflect consensus.

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[[:|WP:LIVING WP:BLP]]

This page in a nutshell: Articles about living persons, which require a degree of sensitivity, must adhere strictly to Wikipedia's content policies. Unsourced or poorly sourced negative material about living persons should be removed immediately from both the article and the talk page.

Editors must take particular care when writing biographies of living persons, which require a degree of sensitivity, and which must adhere strictly to our content policies:

We must get the article right. Be very firm about high quality references, particularly about details of personal lives. Unsourced or poorly sourced negative material about living persons should be removed immediately from both the article and the talk page. ^[1] These principles also apply to biographical material about living persons in other articles.

Rationale

Well-founded complaints about biographical articles from their subjects arrive daily in the form of e-mails to the Wikipedia contact address, phone calls to the Foundation headquarters and to Jimbo Wales, and via postal mail. These people are justifiably upset when they find inaccurate or distorted articles, and the successful resolution of such complaints is a touchy matter requiring ongoing involvement of OTRS volunteers and paid staff.

Frequently the problem is compounded when the subject attempts to edit their own article to remove problematic content. Since such people may not be regular Wikipedians, they are unaware of our policies, and are often accused of vandalism or revert warring when they are in fact trying to edit in good faith.

Accordingly, editors must take particular care with writing and editing biographies of living persons with these key areas in mind:

The article itself must be edited with a degree of sensitivity and strict adherence to our content policies;
If the subject edits the article, it is of vital importance to assume good faith;
If an anon IP address or a new account turns up to blank a page about a living person, or a section of it, it may well be the subject. Try not to act aggressively, but instead engage the person in dialogue, and check that the article in question does not contain any unsourced or poorly sourced criticism. If it does, delete it.

Writing style

Biographies of living people should be written responsibly, conservatively, and in a neutral, encyclopedic tone. While a strategy of eventualism may apply to other subject areas, badly written biographies of living persons should be stubbed or deleted.

The article should document, in a non-partisan manner, what reliable third party sources have published about the subject and, in some circumstances, what the subject may have published about themselves. The writing style should be neutral, factual, and understated, avoiding both a sympathetic point of view and an advocacy journalism point of view.

Remove unsourced criticism

Editors should remove any unsourced or poorly sourced negative material from biographies of living persons and their talk pages, and may do so without discussion; this is also listed as an exception to the three-revert rule. This principle also applies to biographical material about living persons found anywhere in Wikipedia. Administrators may enforce the removal of unsourced material with page protection and blocks, even if they have been editing the article themselves. Editors who re-insert the material may be warned and blocked. See the blocking policy and Wikipedia:Libel.

Administrators encountering biographies that are unsourced and negative in tone, where there is no NPOV version to revert to, should delete the article without discussion (see WP:CSD criteria A6).

Jimmy Wales has said: "I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons." ^[1]

Template

Template:Blp may be added to the talk pages of biographies of living persons so that editors and readers, including subjects, are alerted to this guideline.

Reliable sources

Any assertion in a biography of a living person that might be defamatory if untrue must be sourced. Without reliable third-party sources, a biography will violate No original research and Verifiability, and could lead to libel claims.

Information available solely on partisan websites or in obscure newspapers should be handled with caution, and, if derogatory, should not be used at all. Information found in self-published books, newspapers, or websites/blogs should never be used, unless written by the subject (see below).

Using the subject as a source

In some cases the subject may become involved in an article. They may edit it themselves or have a representative of theirs edit it. They may contact Wikipedians either through the article's talk page or via email. Or, they may provide information through press releases, a personal website or blog, or an autobiography. When information supplied by the subject conflicts with unsourced statements in the article, the unsourced statements should be removed.

Information supplied by the subject may be added to the article if:

It is relevant to the person's notability;
It is not contentious;
It is not unduly self-serving;
It does not involve claims about third parties, or about events not directly related to the subject;
There is no reasonable doubt that it was written by the subject.

A blog or personal website written by the subject may be listed in the external links/further reading section, even if the subject is not used as a source.

Presumption in favor of privacy

Biographies of living people must be written conservatively and with due regard to the subject's privacy.

Public figures

In the case of significant public figures, there will be a multitude of reliable, third-party published sources to take information from, and Wikipedia biographies should simply document what these sources say. If an allegation or incident is notable, relevant, and well-documented by reliable published sources, it belongs in the article — even if it's negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it. If it is not documented by reliable third-party sources, leave it out.

Example: "John Doe had a messy divorce from Jane Doe." Is it notable, verifiable and important to the article? If not, leave it out.

Example: A politician is alleged to have had an affair. He denies it, but the New York Times publishes the allegations, and there is a public scandal. The allegation may belong in the biography, citing the New York Times as the source.

Material from primary sources should generally not be used. For example, public records may include personal details such as home value, outcomes of civil court cases, traffic citations, arrest records, and vehicles and real estate owned. Use material only from reliable third-party sources. If X's arrest records are relevant to his notability, someone else will have written about them.

Non-public figures

Wikipedia also contains biographies of people who, while notable enough for an entry, are nevertheless entitled to the respect for privacy afforded non-public figures. In such cases, editors should exercise restraint and include only information relevant to their notability. Material from primary sources should generally not be used (see above).

In borderline cases, the rule of thumb should be "do no harm." It is not our job to be sensationalist, or to be the primary vehicle for the spread of titillating claims about people's lives.

Privacy of birthdays

Wikipedia includes exact birthdates for some famous people, but including this information for most living people should be handled with caution. While many well-known living persons' exact birthdays are widely known and available to the public, the same is not always true for marginally notable people or non-public figures. With identity theft on the rise, it has become increasingly common for people to consider their exact date of birth to be private information. When in doubt about the notability of the person in question, or if the subject of a biography complains about the publication of his or her date of birth, err on the side of caution and simply list the year of birth rather than the exact date.

Critics

Malicious editing

Editors should be on the lookout for the malicious creation or editing of biographies or biographical information. If someone appears to be pushing an agenda or a biased point of view, insist on reliable third-party published sources and a clear demonstration of relevance to the person's notability.

Opinions of critics, opponents, and detractors

The views of critics should be represented if their views are relevant to the subject's notability and are based on reliable sources, and so long as the material is written in a manner that does not overwhelm the article or appear to side with the critics' material. Be careful not to give a disproportionate amount of space to critics in case you represent a minority view as if it were the majority one. If the criticism represents the views of a tiny minority, it has no place in the article.

Criticism should be sourced to reliable sources and should be about the subject of the article specifically. Beware of claims that rely on guilt by association.

Use of categories

Category names do not carry disclaimers or modifiers, so the case for the category must be made clear in the article text. The article must state the facts that result in the use of the category tag and these facts must be sourced.

For example, Category:Criminals should only be added when the notable crime has been described in the article, sources given, and the person has either been convicted or pleaded guilty.

Category tags regarding religious beliefs and sexual preference should not be used unless two criteria are met:

The subject publicly self-identifies with the belief or preference in question
The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life

Caution should be used in adding categories that suggest the person has a low reputation. See Invasion of privacy#False light.

Dealing with edits by the subject of the article

While Wikipedia discourages people from writing new articles about themselves or expanding existing ones significantly, subjects of articles remain welcome to edit articles to correct inaccuracies or to remove inaccurate or unsourced material.

Anonymous edits that blank all or part of a biography of a living person should be evaluated carefully. When the individual involved is not especially notable, such edits usually are not vandalism but rather an effort by the subject of the article to remove biased or inaccurate material. RC patrollers and others who become involved should be careful to be sure who they're dealing with in such cases, and the use of inflammatory edit summaries or vandalism-related talk page templates should be avoided.

The Arbitration Committee has ruled in favor of showing mercy to the subjects of biographies, especially when those subjects become Wikipedia editors:

For those who either have or might have an article about themselves it is a temptation, especially if plainly wrong, or strongly negative information is included, to become involved in questions regarding their own article. This can open the door to rather immature behavior and loss of dignity. It is a violation of don't bite the newbies to strongly criticize users who fall into this trap rather than seeing this phenomenon as a newbie mistake.
—Arbitration Committee decision (December 18, 2005)

Dealing with articles about yourself

If you have a query about or problem with an article about yourself, you can contact Wikipedia via email. Alternatively, please refer the editors on the page to this guideline. If you need help in enforcing the guideline, contact an administrator. See Wikipedia:List of administrators.

Legal concerns

If you are the subject of a biography and you have a legal concern, the designated agent for Wikipedia is:

Jimmy Wales, Designated Agent
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
146 2nd St N, # 310
St. Petersburg FL 33701
United States
Facsimile number: +1(727)258-0207
Email: board "at" wikimedia.org (replace the "at" with @)

E-mails may also be sent to: info-en "at" wikipedia.org (replace the "at" with @)

More contact data

Notes

^ ^a ^b "WikiEN-l Zero information is preferred to misleading or false information", Jimmy Wales, May 16, 2006