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A Tweetbot Caught the Russian Gov't Editing Flight MH17 Wikipedia Info

Remember @CongressEdits, the tweetbot that alerts whenever a Wikipedia article is edited from a government IP address? There's a Russian version now, and it just uncovered some pretty drastic edits to a Wikipedia article that mentions Flight MH17, originating from a Russian government IP address.

As The Telegraph reports, @RuGovEdits tweeted that a computer user from within the All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company (VHTRK) edited the Russian-language version of the Wikipedia entry about the Malaysian Airlines passenger jet shot down over Ukraine yesterday.

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The original version of the Wikipedia article listing civil aviation accidents stated that MH17 had been shot down "by terrorists of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic with Buk system missiles, which the terrorists received from the Russian Federation." Emphasis added.

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The edits originating from the government-owned computer changed the article to read "the plane [flight MH17] was shot down by Ukrainian soldiers". Again, emphasis added.

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@RuGovEdits alerted the public with a tweet that says (translated): "Wikipedia article List of aircraft accidents in civil aviation has been edited by RTR [another name for VGTRK]".

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If @RuGovEdits is to be trusted (and considering the Wiki-twitterbot code is widely available on Github, it probably can be), it certainly seems like someone within the Russian government is working to hide the widely-held theory that Russian weapons were used to bring down MH17. But while Wikipedia might be malleable, it's also transparent. [The Telegraph via Amanda Zamora]