De Blasio rips cops for Wikipedia edits but his staff did the same
Mayor Bill de Blasio on Monday scolded the cops who used NYPD computers to edit Wikipedia pages but his memory got hazy when asked how it was any different from his campaign staffers making changes to his own page on the website.
This is a well-known city policy where people are not supposed to have any personal activity on city computers, on city equipment, de Blasio said in addressing the cops who altered pages on Eric Garner, Sean Bell and Amadou Diallo.
Were quite clear that if youre using city computers for personal business, this is not authorized, he said.
In 2012, The Post reported that staffers for de Blasio, then the public advocate and a mayoral candidate, altered his Wikipedia page by removing Warren Wilhelm as his birth name and adding that he is of German-American and Italian-American heritage.
Of course, we update the page, de Blasio spokesman Wiley Norvell said at the time. Thats become standard practice for public officials.
But on Monday, when pressed about those changes, de Blasio said he didnt remember them and then added they could only be made if it were part of a staffers job responsibilities.
He also sidestepped a reporters question on whether his aides were authorized to edit his Wikipedia page at the time.
I dont remember that incident, he said.
The mayors memory failure came right after Police Commissioner Bill Bratton who was standing next to him at a press conference told reporters that the cops wouldnt be punished.
Were in the process of reviewing our social-media policy, Bratton said. We have a ... three-tiered system in which certain individuals are authorized to do certain things. Wikipedia, for example, we dont have a policy specific to accessing that site.
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De Blasio rips cops for Wikipedia edits but his staff did the same