A variety of Wikipedia articles were replaced with images of swastikas Monday morning. Pages defaced include those for celebrities Johnny Depp, according to Input, as well as Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez according to Insider.
Several pages for politicians appeared to be vandalized too, such as those for Vice President Kamala Harris and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. A representative from Wikimedia told Mashable that a Wiki template used to support page functionality was vandalized on English Wikipedia, resulted in the Nazi flag appearing on a wide range of articles.
The anti-Semitic symbol was apparently only on these pages for five minutes, the rep said, and the template was protected from future behavior by volunteers. Wikimedia usually avoids this in the spirit of open editing, but Wikimedia stated they do so in incidents that warrant page locking.
“This type of behavior is unacceptable on Wikipedia and violates a number of Wikipedia’s policies,” said the rep. “Volunteer administrators have already fixed the vandalism, blocked the account responsible, and will further evaluate the situation to see if additional recourse is needed.”
While horrific, Wikimedia said that volunteers have experience with this type of vandalism. Because of this, the site has tools to quickly spot and revert these changes.
UPDATE: Aug. 16, 2021, 1 p.m. EDT This article has been updated with context and comment from a Wikimedia representative.
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