Locked Tree
I just had someone go through an aspect of my 4 generation tree and change a bunch of names and dates that weren't even close to being correct. All these changes were done by the same user and they weren't even close, it was taking verified birthdays from 1800s and changing them to 1900s and moving them from birthplaces of Denmark to Scotland. These were on family members whose work had been done and all have 20+ sources showing their name and dates as being correct. It happened to about 10 people in my tree. If there was a way to lock changes from being made with something that has so much source evidence backing it up that it couldn't be changed until close kin (who are active on FamilySearch) could "approve" those changes. Especially on ones where the temple work is completed.
Comments
-
Please note I am not a staff member of FS.
The FamilySearch Family Tree (FSFT) operates on an "open edit" basis. Anyone with an account can edit the details of deceased profiles.
A small number of profiles are "read only" and cannot be edited. However it is not possible to request that a profile be made read-only, see this article: https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/what-are-read-only-records-in-family-tree#:~:text=Read%2Donly%20records%20show%20a,only%2C%22%20it%20prevents%20collaboration.
If you believe the user is being a vandal or is extremely incompetent, then you should report the profile IDs here and FS will decide whether they will take action against the user.
Unfortunately, in most cases FS will not intervene in cases like this. You should reverse the edits made and get in contact with the user. If the user persists or is abusive then you should report it in this forum. However if you have a good-faith disagreement about facts, then you'll have to resolve it yourselves without help from FS.
1 -
The sooner you contact this person the better. Likely incompetence. Click on their name and message them ASAP. Hopefully they will respond to your message. Also there may be an email listed for them if so use that too. Click the Star to place a Follow on those profiles. At the same time go ahead and start following the advise above from A Van Helsdingen. Click Show All under Latest Changes and start reversing/restoring everything.
2 -
I understand it's an open system, I'm just saying there are some arguments to be made where it should be "locked", especially in a 4 generations sense where you potentially have family members living who have first hand knowledge of the accuracy of things and then some random person comes in and makes large sweeping changes.
Believe me this was more than just a "disagreement" this was like they made no attempt to verify any data, nothing in the source they attached was even remotely close to being accurate.
2 -
If you cannot communicate with the other user, and you are confident that there was malicious intent, use the Report Abuse feature on each profile showing those changes. Be prepared to give careful evidence of the abuse.
2 -
Most often this behavior is not malicious, but clueless. They don't know how to make profiles from scratch so they find a family in the tree and repurpose it.
In my experience the easiest way to stop the behavior is to create the apparently desired profiles and lead the contributor to them.
4 -
Have you tried (at least the first time) very politely contacting the person through the user name and/or an email that is part of the person's FamilySearch profile? If not, that's always the best first step (after calming down from the understandable frustration at what appear to be idiotic changes 😁) . Write to the person with an attitude that suggests you are willing to work with them, that they made an honest mistake, and in your email/message include some specific source data you've got that essentially proves you're correct. If you're absolutely certain you did not make any mistakes yourself, then go ahead and reverse the changes as suggested by @A van Helsdingen and @Chas Howell above. That's one of the very nice features of the Family Tree in FamilySearch - you can go to a person's "Person Page" and immediately see any and all changes made, see who made them (which allows you to contact them), and restore the changes to what was in place prior to the erroneous changes.
Then in your message let the person know you already made the changes, followed by your very specific source-based justification to show you're correct. Let them know you're informing them as a matter of courtesy since someone by the same names in that person's own tree are certainly valuable to them as well, and you didn't want them to think you were doing something malicious or poorly researched to them.
Then if they're halfway reasonable and also realize their error, your change back to what you know to be correct is likely to stand after that. With even more good luck, you might even create a new collaborator if it turns out there's a family relationship with that other person, and you can help each other (even though it sounds like you're ahead of them on research and documentation skills).
But as stated previously, if it continues, keep it well documented and resubmit it to FamilySearch for them to take appropriate action. If they find a person to be unreasonably incompetent or even malicious, they can take measures to prevent such behavior again. But hopefuly it won't have to come to that. Using the above approach with someone who unattached everyone prior to my grandfather from Family Tree! Yes, I was boiling too, when I first discovered that. But I politely contacted the other person, and was pleasantly surprised to get a very nice reply that ended up resulting in a phone call, during which he acknowledged his "dumb" mistake, and he literally logged on to FamilySearch and made the changes himself (before I'd even UNchanged his changes). We corresponded by message or email (can't recall which) a time or two after that on a couple of things, and not only were positive experiences had at both ends, I am certain not to have any further problems with the other individual.
It doesn't always turn out that way, but it never hurts to go into the resolution at first with the assumption that the person was just plain amazingly incompetent (but not intentionally malicious) in researching and documenting, as suggested by @dontiknowyou above, and not create an instant enemy with whom you can't work out a solution.
Just my 2¢....
--Chris
1
