[LINK] PM's staff shifts the Wikipedia blame

[Rick Welykochy]

<http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/pms-staff-shifts-the-wikipedia-blame/2007/08/29/1188067191576.html>

or

<http://tinyurl.com/2fxrek>

     THE Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet has blamed a mistake by its
     internet service provider for embarrassing reports its staff were editing
     politically sensitive Wikipedia entries.

     Last week the Herald reported that staff in the department had been editing
     Wikipedia entries, including one on the Treasurer, Peter Costello, to remove
     details that might be damaging to the Government.

     But Dr Peter Shergold, the department's secretary, said the internet address
     of the computer used to edit the entries was not that of the department as
     it had been "allocated to another customer in early 2005 by our internet service
     provider", Macquarie Telecom. His deputy, Dr Louise Morauta, said Macquarie
     Telecom had "made it appear" it was the department's address "when in fact it was not".

Well, that's a hard one to swallow, Dr Shergold.

One of the IP addresses in question is 210.193.176.115.

<http://www.ip2location.com/demo.aspx> reports the following:

210.193.176.150
210.193.176.115
210.193.176.100
210.193.176.80
210.193.176.60
210.193.176.45
210.193.176.30
210.193.176.19

are ALL "Dept of Prime Minister and Cabinet", Canberra.

If the information regarding these IP addresses is incorrect and actually
two years out of date as claimed by Shergold, then Macquarie Telecom is
looking pretty incompetent.

But wait, that last address I checked is the PM's own website,
http://pm.gov.au/

Anyone else smell a rat? Does this information belie Shergold's claims?


cheers
rickw


-- 
_________________________________
Rick Welykochy || Praxis Services

I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.
      -- Mark Twain