For reasons that remain a mystery, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has decided to pick a fight with online encyclopedia Wikipedia.
Last week, the FBI sent Wikipedia a letter complaining about the display of the FBI
logo on Wikipedia. The feds assert that the presence of a high-resolution copy of its logo on the site violates a law banning unauthorized reproductions of government insignia. The government adds
that the logo's presence on Wikipedia is "particularly problematic" because the image could facilitate the illegal manufacture of fake badges, id cards or other insignia.
Wikipedia's
counsel, Mike Godwin, fired back a letter declining to remove the logo. He says that the law might prohibit
reproducing the FBI's logo in order to create a fake ID, but doesn't ban its use in an online article. "Badges and identification cards are physical manifestations that may be used by a possessor to
invoke the authority of the federal government. An encyclopedia article is not," he wrote. "The use of the image on Wikipedia is not for the purpose of deception or falsely to represent anyone as an
agent of the federal government."
While there's probably room to argue about the law's wording, it's hard to imagine that a judge would take the FBI's complaints all that seriously given
that the logo's design is hardly a secret.
Meantime, since yesterday morning, versions of the seal have popped up on sites like the San Francisco Chronicle's SFGate.com and Techdirt.