About doxing:
Destiny initially seemed to think that Kiwifarms has a rule against some forms of doxing, like the posting of SSNs or credit card numbers. He was surprised when Null responded by saying that there aren't rules against this. Null continued, basically saying he doesn't want to litigate what counts as doxing and what kinds of information should be prohibited. He wants to be able to apply clear, binary rules to determine if a post is rule-breaking, but "doxing" is too fuzzy of a concept for this to work. So instead, Null deletes posts or bans users if he thinks their primary intent is to harm the lolcow.
I feel like Null could have clarified this a little bit better, and it's important since doxing is the main sticking-point for normal people who hear about KF's woes.
Null mentioned that most ""personal"" information about lolcows is obtained from the lolcows themselves oversharing on social media or from a Kiwi searching through publicly-available resources like
VoterRecords or
Whitepages. This is all 100% legal, and this is a point that should always be hammered. It's no different from how
phonebooks used to be ubiquitous and would list not only the names & phone numbers of regular citizens, but often even their home addresses. Phonebooks were obviously never illegal, and I think they still exist in some places, although they've mostly been replaced by websites like Whitepages.
IMO, Destiny and other people - even if they acknowledge that "doxing" isn't actually illegal - get caught up on the idea of why someone would even post dox in the first place. They assume there must be nefarious intent. I think this is where the disconnect happens when they hear Null talk about how he allows doxing but will ban someone who seems to only be posting to harm a lolcow.
This gets into the sticky issue of "litigating" what counts as doxing. Sure, Null could ban obvious things like SSNs and credit cards... but this absolutely wouldn't satisfy KF's detractors. So what else should he ban to make the detractors happy?
- Should homes addresses of lolcows be banned? And does it make a difference if the lolcow is a public figure (like a politician, etc) or has willingly posted their address on social media? What if it's done to prove that a lolcow is a lying scammer/grifter, as in the case of Ana Mardoll - who constantly begged on Twitter and claimed to be impoverished, but turned out to be living in an expensive house & working for a major defense contractor? Or as another example, how about the Tenacious Unicorn Ranch, who have been running a scam GoFundMe campaign ostensibly to "expand" their operation, but the truth is that they're abandoning their old property and moving back into the family home of their leader?
- Should the real names of lolcows be banned? And again, does it make a difference if they're a public figure? What about if they're a convicted criminal? Should a trans person's "deadname" also be banned from posting as well? I'm sure someone like Bardfinn - a notoriously awful Reddit powermod - would love this. After all, a Kiwi went to a courthouse and (legally) obtained documents proving that Bardfinn is a convicted wifebeater & a deadbeat father who refuses to pay child support. People like Bardfinn commonly troon out or change their name in the first place in order to hide their criminal/unsavory past... should none of this be exposed?
I think you get my point: "doxing" is almost always legal and can serve a legitimate purpose. There's also different kinds of information which all get labelled as "dox", so if you want to litigate what information is allowed and what is prohibited, it'll get murky very quickly - especially if you want to provide exceptions for lolcows who are public figures, criminals, scammers, etc. This is likely why Null broadly allows doxing, but will individually crack down on users who he feels are being overly malicious.
