Birth date over 150 years ago and able to mark person as still living

Question

This is a new profile that was created for https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Hamilton-15501

It shows a birth date of the 1430s but the person is also marked as still living.  From research I have done the oldest living person lived to be under 125 years old.   Can we set some kind of standard that this kind of profile cannot be created?

It also has a yellow privacy lock on it!   HELP!

Answer 1

Hi Laura, et al --

When a person without a pre-1500 badge tries to create a profile w/ a birth date before 1500, they receive a red warning message telling them they need to be certified to create it.

However, this doesn't prevent them from entering alternate information and then changing things after the fact.

It's possible that some additional checks will be added in the future to prevent people from skirting the rules.

Answer 2

On the profile, click the "Family Tree & Tools" tab, scroll down to the "Contact" section, and follow the link for "Open Profile Request Form"

Comments

I couldn't find any Open Profile Request Form in the Contact section, but I have already made a request for the profile to be opened.

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probably not obvious, but my underlined text above was also a direct link to the form: https://www.wikitree.com/contact/openprofile/Hamilton-15501 :)

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Thanks for making the open profile request, Dennis,

Great work!

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That's great. Many thanks for dealing with it.

Answer 3

Mea maxima culpa as this user is a distant relation who I strongly encouraged to join WikiTree.
I have informed him of the rules regarding open profiles. I am already on the Trusted List for this profile and will ask if he will make me PM.

However, I do agree that there seems to be a technical vulnerability issue here that would benefit from investigation.

Regards,

Julie

Comments

so, the person really is still living then, and their birth date should probably be 1930, instead of 1430? :)

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She was born in the 1430s. The biggest problem is not that the profile is not open, but that it is a pre-1500 profile that someone without the pre-1500 badge was able to create.

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This user has created other semi-private profiles for people who are supposed to (according to the biography sections) have been born before 1500.

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ah, yeah... I think anyone can create pre-1500 profiles, but you'd need a badge to later modify them (assuming they're not also private).

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A message has been left for the PM.  Pre-1500 thinks it might be a typo.  But the bigger issue is that this profile should never have been allowed to be created this way.  There should be some criteria for "living" not to exceed 125 or 150 years from birth date.  I think the oldest living person recorded died at 117. 

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He may be creating the profiles with the "still living" parameter (which makes them private), then changing a date on the profile to pre-1500, thus leaving him as the profile manager of the pre-1500 profile that he can no longer edit (but neither can anyone else).

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The profile was imported from a Gedcom. I believe there is a new system so there may be a import vulnerability that requires tweaking.

(Imported data from GEDCOM upload #96964, Person I734)

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I'm already on the trusted list for this profile so if a Leader wants to make me PM I will sort out the issues with the profile.

But there is still the issueof how a profile like this could be created.

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Only a team member (or the current PM could make you a PM). But you may be able to edit the profile to eliminate "Still Living" from the death date entry. That should cause the privacy setting to change.

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And if you are on the Trusted List for the other pre-1500 profiles he has created, you may be able to fix those, too.

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I'm only on the trusted list for that particular profile as I looked into her and couldn't find her in Wood's Peerage, so asked to be added. But the profile was not open, so I couldn't edit...

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Now open, so I will go in and see what I can fix...