Why were my Syrian Profiles deleted?
Hi,I'm a longtime user of this site and I have a question. A while back I made a family tree for a family friend who just so happened to have Syrian roots. I pushed it back as far as I could and I noticed something odd. The profiles of his deceased parents were marked as private for some reason. I couldn't figure out why that was and I just left it alone. I planned to come back to it at a later date. I marked the profiles as "Following" and let them simmer. Unfortunately, I can't find his parents again at the moment.
A few days ago I decided to check on the profiles on the site and to my surprise they were all deleted. I was not contacted about them. The living person at the root of the tree was private and I was following him. Now that profile and the work I did on that tree are gone. Can someone explain what happened?
Thanks!
Answers
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Good morning @ChrisFerraiolo
Profiles for several countries - primarily in the Middle East - are restricted in FamilySearch for various reasons.
Some contributors manage to work around the problem by not including the names of those prohibited/restricted countries in the profiles.
Here's one Help Article about Confidential profiles, something we often see for profiles from that region: https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/how-do-family-tree-profiles-get-marked-as-confidential
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Certain countries' relatives become "Confidential due to security, privacy, or technical issues. If you have someone you know look for the same records and they can view them, then we need to look at a technical issue; if they can not see them, then it may be due to these security and privacy laws or contracts.
This may cause profiles to become restricted or even removed by administrators, or hidden by updated privacy settings. The information may still exist even though it is hidden behind a Confidential label or even removed completely. Certain countries have very strict data privacy laws, which increase these restictions and FamilySearch must abide by these rules, laws, or contract restrictions.
Have you checked the Change log to see if there is a trail? Do you have the PID number to try searching by that method?
Keep trying to access the records over time, as the permissions may change in the future. Remember that the 1920s to the present are not normally allowed because of many privacy restrictions.
I can also suggest that at this time you take advantage of other platforms for research, such as Ancestry or FindMyPast, to name a few, which work under different restrictions than FamilySearch.
Try contacting the original Archives that hold the records if it is still possible to go directly to the source.
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Unfortunately, I don't have a PID. The profiles were completely wiped out. The records are still available. These weren't Syrian records but Mass records. I can find them. However, the profiles I had them on are completely gone.
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@ChrisFerraiolo Just so I understand - were these profiles created by your account or by my friend's account? I have some Syria relatives and the way I get to them is from the person list.
If these were added by you, they should be viewable in your person list.
If they were added under your friends' account, only they will be able to see them.
Can you find any of the Massachusetts sources and see if they are attached to someone?
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My account. I looked at my person list and they aren't there. The Massachusetts sources are not attached to anyone at the moment.
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Could you have accidentally set up two accounts? Others have done this without realizing it. If so, you can only see living or confidential people in the account they were created in. An administrator here should be able to search for a forgotten account.
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No, I didn't. It's the same account I've been using for almost a decade.
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I would recommend that you contact Support for help. None of these profiles have been deleted -- they are simply no longer visible to you. A data administrator can find these profiles you created and help you understand what happened. First-level support will be unlikely to know what's going on, so this may take some persistence on your part to reach someone who understands the issues and can see the relevant profiles.
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And when @ChrisFerraiolo calls, Support will likely suggest posting in the Community for help.
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Indeed. Best to cut out the middleman here. =D
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