WIKIMEDIA, CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHERPubPeer administrators do not want to log the IP addresses of anonymous commenters who post on the website, according to neuroscientist Brandon Stell, a cofounder of the post-publication peer review platform. Stell and colleagues were prompted to make this change following a legal complaint filed by Fazlul Sarkar, a researcher whose publication record has been called into question by PubPeer users commenting anonymously on the site.
Stell told The Scientist that PubPeer administrators made the decision to stop collecting IP addresses “in the months following” receipt of a letter from Nicholas Roumel, a lawyer representing Sarkar, dated October 9, 2014. Stell added that PubPeer chose to cease collecting and logging IP addresses of anonymous users in order to protect them from future subpoenas like the one that Sarkar’s attorney is pursuing in appellate courts to gain the identities of commenters who allegedly defamed Sarkar, formerly of Wayne State University in Detroit. “If we don’t have the [IP address] information, then, if we’re served with a subpoena . . . we have nothing to give away,” Stell told The Scientist today (October 4), following a Michigan State Court of Appeals hearing (Fazlul ...
