Re: PSA: Do not use "Reported-By" without reporter's approval

[Theodore Ts'o]

On Wed, May 22, 2019 at 03:58:04PM -0400, Konstantin Ryabitsev wrote:
> > If the report is public, and lists like vger are public,
> > then using a Reported-by: and/or a Link: are simply useful
> > history and tracking information.
> 
> I'm perfectly fine with Link:, however Reported-By: usually has the person's
> name and email address (i.e. PII data per GDPR definition). If that pehrson
> submitted the bug report via bugzilla.kernel.org or a similar resource,
> their expectation is that they can delete their account should they choose
> to to do so. However, if the patch containing Reported-By is committed to
> git, their PII becomes permanently and immutably recorded for any reasonable
> meaning of the word "forever."

Many (most?) bugzilla.kernel.org components result in e-mail getting
sent to vger.kernel.org mailing lists.  So even if they delete the
bugzilla account, there e-mail will be immortalized in lore.kernel.org
and their associated git repositories.

So perhaps a better approach is to put a warning alerting bug
reporters that submitting a bug means their e-mail will end up get
broadcasting in public mailing list archives and public git
repositories?

I assume distro engineers who are fixing bugs from their Distro
bugzillas which support non-public bugs already know that they
shouldn't be revealing their customers' identities.  But
realistically, while I agree it would be nice to ask people if they
don't mind being immortalized in git repositories, we should probably
warn people that when they submit a bug, or for that matter, send
e-mail to a kernel mailing list, they're going to be immortalized in a
git repository *already*.

						- Ted