MyHeritage Sync Obliterated Thousands of FamilySearch Sources
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wuzit2u said: I'm not sure this is the proper place for this, but I didn't see a problems section of the forum, so here I am. Honestly, I'm terrified of how this will be received, and forgive me for not sticking to a few paragraphs, but I'm absolutely desperate for help and a kind FS user directed me here.
Essentially, FamilySearch data can be COMPLETELY COMPROMISED by changes made by a single user via MyHeritage sync. From previous posts I see that this was a known issue over a year ago. It just happened to my tree and the results have been disastrous. And I was the one who accidentally caused it.
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Two days ago I made a catastrophic mistake by syncing my tree between My Heritage and FamilySearch. With just a few clicks I've undone the work of hundreds of people and years of effort, including my own. Over 7000 sources detached from 1808 people, 8 generations, their spouses, and children affected. All wiped clean of EVERY source on FamilySearch in an instant.
I signed up for MyHeritage about a week ago because it was a recommended to me as a FamilySearch Partner, for backing up my portion of the tree. I downloaded my FS tree to the MyHeritage site, and spent some time testing out the site and attaching a few records here and there.
I spent the rest of week making a large amount of changes and uploads to FamilySearch and wanted it backed up to MyHeritage. I didn't want all my "test files" (which were essentially duplicates of the same records already on FS) transferred back over to FamilySearch, so I went to the MH sources page to delete them. Somehow while doing this I inadvertently deleted their entire package of sources from the initial transfer from FamilySearch.
I read the sync page carefully before initiating it, but it seemed vague to me, and I interpreted the phrases "A person or memory that you delete on MyHeritage will never be deleted on FamilySearch by the sync process." and that it would "synchronize the sources" as an additive process, not a deletion. The same way Ancestry can add information to FS, but does in no way alter the original sources. I honestly thought syncing would RESTORE the sources, not DELETE them. I had absolutely no idea that MyHeritage's version of a person's data is considered the primary source in this syncing process, and I never imagined that MyHeritage had the ability to actually detach sources from FamilySearch. To my everlasting regret, that is NOT the case.
While the sync was in progress, I was on FamilySearch and realized that one of my relatives suddenly had no sources. And another. I found page after page of changelog source deletions with my username and the reason 'Deleted from MyHeritage".
I immediately revoked access to MyHeritage from the FamilySearch site, and tried to find a way to stop the sync, but the process is automated and couldn't be aborted. By then it was far, far too late. I called MyHeritage immediately; the service rep I spoke with had no idea they were partnered with FamilySearch, no way to stop the transfer. She put in a ticket with Tech Support, but no confirmation number before she hung up. I've called several times, but there's nothing from their end. At this point, I don't know that I'd trust another sync with them, even if they assured me they could "fix" it. Not after this.
I called FamilySearch support the minute they opened and spent two hours on the phone trying to find a department that could help me. Everyone I talked to seemed baffled that this could happen. I was given several case numbers, and while I was still on the phone received the following single line response in an email from ServiceNow: "we do not support MyHeritage". I have no idea if it's even being looked into this point.
In the meantime, I'm desperately doing everything I can to mitigate some of the damage. I've been restoring records through the change-log, person by person, doing it this way so I don't take "credit" for the source, so it remains under the name of the user who originally created it. It is an incredibly tedious process, I spent a full TWENTY hours yesterday restoring sources, and then realized FS's process to restore the sources does not restore the tags, so will have to essentially start over and re-tag all the sources as well. This could take months. I am completely overwhelmed. I have eyestrain at this point and am a nervous wreck. I've barely slept since this happened.
I am left fielding multiple messages from upset users, and someone even found my email and blasted me with a few "choice words". I can't even blame them for it.
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I do understand that you "do not support MyHeritage." But the real issue here is the massive amount of damage caused to your own site by a partner site. Why in the world would Family Search allow MyHeritage such complete, unfettered and unsupervised access to make changes to FamilySearch's own on-site data based on one single user's input, and at this magnitude? It should NEVER have occurred, and never should have had the possibility of it occurring.
So, ideas.
*MyHeritage's access to FamilySearch needs to be reviewed immediately. Revoke or severely limit MyHeritage's control over FamilySearch's data. DO NOT allow them to delete or detach ANYTHING. My disaster was accidental. Someone could easily do this maliciously to a single person, family, or an entire tree.
*Add a function to restore a source's associated tags when the source is restored through the change-log. As it stands, they are not restored and have to be entered manually.
*Add a Restore button to the entry for a source's detachment in the change-log, instead of making the user track the original source down through the entire changelog history to restore it (multiple sources can have the same name, so it gets confusing).
*Is there no backup to restore from? No way to revert all changes made to a person's profile within 24 or 48 hours? It seems like FamilySearch should have some way to reverse the changes made by any external website built in.
This is an unmitigated disaster. An absolute tragedy. I am completely devastated. I have destroyed the life's work of so many people. And I've restored so many sources in the last 48 hours trying to correct this that I'm terrified FamilySearch will just lock my account. I don't even want to "show my face" on the site again after all of this, but I'm desperate to fix it. Any credibility I ever had is absolutely ruined over a technical issue.
Essentially, FamilySearch data can be COMPLETELY COMPROMISED by changes made by a single user via MyHeritage sync. From previous posts I see that this was a known issue over a year ago. It just happened to my tree and the results have been disastrous. And I was the one who accidentally caused it.
-------------
Two days ago I made a catastrophic mistake by syncing my tree between My Heritage and FamilySearch. With just a few clicks I've undone the work of hundreds of people and years of effort, including my own. Over 7000 sources detached from 1808 people, 8 generations, their spouses, and children affected. All wiped clean of EVERY source on FamilySearch in an instant.
I signed up for MyHeritage about a week ago because it was a recommended to me as a FamilySearch Partner, for backing up my portion of the tree. I downloaded my FS tree to the MyHeritage site, and spent some time testing out the site and attaching a few records here and there.
I spent the rest of week making a large amount of changes and uploads to FamilySearch and wanted it backed up to MyHeritage. I didn't want all my "test files" (which were essentially duplicates of the same records already on FS) transferred back over to FamilySearch, so I went to the MH sources page to delete them. Somehow while doing this I inadvertently deleted their entire package of sources from the initial transfer from FamilySearch.
I read the sync page carefully before initiating it, but it seemed vague to me, and I interpreted the phrases "A person or memory that you delete on MyHeritage will never be deleted on FamilySearch by the sync process." and that it would "synchronize the sources" as an additive process, not a deletion. The same way Ancestry can add information to FS, but does in no way alter the original sources. I honestly thought syncing would RESTORE the sources, not DELETE them. I had absolutely no idea that MyHeritage's version of a person's data is considered the primary source in this syncing process, and I never imagined that MyHeritage had the ability to actually detach sources from FamilySearch. To my everlasting regret, that is NOT the case.
While the sync was in progress, I was on FamilySearch and realized that one of my relatives suddenly had no sources. And another. I found page after page of changelog source deletions with my username and the reason 'Deleted from MyHeritage".
I immediately revoked access to MyHeritage from the FamilySearch site, and tried to find a way to stop the sync, but the process is automated and couldn't be aborted. By then it was far, far too late. I called MyHeritage immediately; the service rep I spoke with had no idea they were partnered with FamilySearch, no way to stop the transfer. She put in a ticket with Tech Support, but no confirmation number before she hung up. I've called several times, but there's nothing from their end. At this point, I don't know that I'd trust another sync with them, even if they assured me they could "fix" it. Not after this.
I called FamilySearch support the minute they opened and spent two hours on the phone trying to find a department that could help me. Everyone I talked to seemed baffled that this could happen. I was given several case numbers, and while I was still on the phone received the following single line response in an email from ServiceNow: "we do not support MyHeritage". I have no idea if it's even being looked into this point.
In the meantime, I'm desperately doing everything I can to mitigate some of the damage. I've been restoring records through the change-log, person by person, doing it this way so I don't take "credit" for the source, so it remains under the name of the user who originally created it. It is an incredibly tedious process, I spent a full TWENTY hours yesterday restoring sources, and then realized FS's process to restore the sources does not restore the tags, so will have to essentially start over and re-tag all the sources as well. This could take months. I am completely overwhelmed. I have eyestrain at this point and am a nervous wreck. I've barely slept since this happened.
I am left fielding multiple messages from upset users, and someone even found my email and blasted me with a few "choice words". I can't even blame them for it.
-------------
I do understand that you "do not support MyHeritage." But the real issue here is the massive amount of damage caused to your own site by a partner site. Why in the world would Family Search allow MyHeritage such complete, unfettered and unsupervised access to make changes to FamilySearch's own on-site data based on one single user's input, and at this magnitude? It should NEVER have occurred, and never should have had the possibility of it occurring.
So, ideas.
*MyHeritage's access to FamilySearch needs to be reviewed immediately. Revoke or severely limit MyHeritage's control over FamilySearch's data. DO NOT allow them to delete or detach ANYTHING. My disaster was accidental. Someone could easily do this maliciously to a single person, family, or an entire tree.
*Add a function to restore a source's associated tags when the source is restored through the change-log. As it stands, they are not restored and have to be entered manually.
*Add a Restore button to the entry for a source's detachment in the change-log, instead of making the user track the original source down through the entire changelog history to restore it (multiple sources can have the same name, so it gets confusing).
*Is there no backup to restore from? No way to revert all changes made to a person's profile within 24 or 48 hours? It seems like FamilySearch should have some way to reverse the changes made by any external website built in.
This is an unmitigated disaster. An absolute tragedy. I am completely devastated. I have destroyed the life's work of so many people. And I've restored so many sources in the last 48 hours trying to correct this that I'm terrified FamilySearch will just lock my account. I don't even want to "show my face" on the site again after all of this, but I'm desperate to fix it. Any credibility I ever had is absolutely ruined over a technical issue.
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Comments
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FamilySearch Moderator said: Thank you for posting this. This will be immediately forwarded to the teams at FamilySearch to investigate.
Would you mind posting a few PID that were impacted?
Thanks.0 -
wuzit2u said: Thank you!
Like I said, I've been desperately reattaching files. so a portion of my closer ancestors have been somewhat restored. The tags are still missing on almost all of them, though.
My grandfather: KWZ6-LF7
I've worked on his mother's line, but I have not worked on his paternal line yet, so those should all be missing eight generation back unless someone has gone in and done their own attachments already. All spouses and children affected)
LH93-8P2 One of my grandfather's most distant ancestors, 5 generations back, and his two wives and children.
LDZF-CT8 My Grandmother on the other side, sources reattached, but tags still missing from all vital events.0 -
jimmy.zimmerman said: Thank you for posting this. I'm sorry for the distress that this has caused you. Please send me an email (jimmy@familysearch.org) with your FamilySearch and MyHeritage username.
I believe we can do something to help remedy the situation.
Thank you for the recommendations. We'll take them into consideration as we continue to work with MyHeritage.0 -
wuzit2u said: Thank you both so much for your prompt response. The information has been emailed to you.0
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Christine said: Oh wow! I am so sorry this has happened, but so glad you have shared this to hopefully prevent it from happening again!
Warning for everyone. DO NOT SYNC WITH MY HERITAGE!!!0 -
Kathryn Grant said: Adding my thanks! So glad you shared this issue so it can be addressed. And kudos to FamilySearch for jumping on the problem so quickly. I look forward to hearing more about how it will be resolved.0
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Tom Huber said: This same problem happened a couple of years ago with MyHeritage. The problem was addressed by MyHeritage and it turned out that it was caught soon enough not to cause major damage. The problem occurred on the My Heritage site.
At that time, My Heritage wanted (and stated this on their site) a shortcut around the issue of having to update just one field at a time with the option to add a reason statement. Instead, they wanted their users to be able to Create a tree in My Heritage with the user's tree in FamilySerch, be able to edit it in MyHeritage and then mass update it by synchronizing the two trees, where any change in the MH tree transferred over to the FS portion of the massive tree.
The problem is that there never should be shortcuts when updating the massive tree. Comparisons need to be made to validate which information is correct. If the user wants to impose their own conclusions (with or without sources) then that update should never change more than one event at a time. This has been an on-going problem with the GEDCOM import/compare/update problem on FamilySearch and at this point, it is no longer easy to make a mess of things with an imported GEDCOM. A mess can still be made, but it takes time and for most people, they don't bother using their GEDCOM to update the massive FS tree.0 -
Christine said: Why is there not a restore button for detached sources?0
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Kathryn Grant said: Tom, I was thinking something similar. Mass updates don't have a good track record in FamilySearch, regardless of how they're made. It's much more trustworthy to verify one name at a time and make updates that way.
Shortcuts may be appealing with the promise of time saved, but too often they don't live up to their promise. We lose more time repairing damage than we saved by the shortcut. This is true in many other areas of life, not just family history.0 -
joe martel said: The team is reviewing an internal process to restore all these Sources. I would guess this will be done very soon assuming there are no side-effects.
As for a restore button for a detached Source: if you go to the change log there will be a Restore button next to the entry where the Source was initially attached. The user is then presented the changelog entry for that Source including the contributor, timestamp and Reason for why the Source was detached. This confirmation screen then lets you Restore the attachment.
So the next question is, "Why isn't the Restore next to the Detach action in the Changelog". There's a long complicated reason for why Restore works this way for all actions, and there was a future design that would allow the user to see all the actions for that particular object, and get to the original entry. Doubt that will be implemented.0 -
wuzit2u said: That's a bit disappointing to hear. When I was working to try and restore some of all this mess, I would often have to sift through pages upon pages of changelog data to find the exact match to a deleted source to try and reattach it. Many sources had titles that were exact duplicates, so finding the correct one became an arduous task. I had to open each possible version of the source and compare the URLs to determine which of those identical source titles was the correct one.
If I came across another of those identical titles, I'd have to repeat the process again. Tedious, and easy to miss things. Is there any way the URL or at the very least the record's 7 digit code could be added as additional information to each entry for attachments and detachments on the changelog page so they're slightly easier to identify in the case of duplicated titles?0 -
joe martel said: At this point I would hold off making any changes and see if the engineering team can recover this.0
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Christine said: Joe will there be processes be out in place to prevent this from happening again?0
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Robert Wren said: MyHeritage provides a "Sync" report which shows a complete list of changes made in the process. It shows each individual changed and what the changes were.
The sync was (re)designed, after the first fiasco referred to above. In my experience it works fairly well. But it IS difficult to keep track of.0 -
Cherie Gardner Rawlings said: This is exactly what I was afraid of when a certain individual was making the rounds inviting staff members at many of the Utah County family history centers to use this new feature.
Kathryn Grant is correct: “Mass updates don't have a good track record in FamilySearch, regardless of how they're made. It's much more trustworthy to verify one name at a time and make updates that way.”0 -
Christine said: Any updates? With rootstech this week (guessing My Heritage will have a booth and probably some classes!) I sure hope family search is able to put some locks in place to prevent this from happening again.0
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jimmy.zimmerman said: A few updates:
1. MyHeritage Sync is temporarily disabled. It will be reenabled when the system prevents this from happening again.
2. MyHeritage has been able to identify the mechanism that wuzit2u inadvertently used to delete the sources. They will disable this capability for FamilySearch sync'ed trees.
3. MyHeritage will change the behavior of the sync to no longer detach sources on the FamilySearch side. It will flag these changes to the user so that the user can manually make changes on FamilySearch if the user so desires.
4. I ran a data restore on all persons who were not updated since the sources were detached. This brought back ~4700 sources. Further effort will be made to restore the rest of the sources, attempting to not create duplicate sources.
Thank you everyone for your recommendations and for your patience.0 -
Christine said: Jimmy that is FABULOUS news!0
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jimmy.zimmerman said: Update:
I was able to restore another ~2400 sources. This includes a large set sources that wuzit2u restored by hand through the Change History but for some reason it did not restore the tags. The tags are now restored on all of those source attachments.
What remains is a more difficult problem on 146 persons where users have already begun reattaching sources through hints and the source linker. I'll need to sort through which of the remaining 1600 detached sources can be restored without causing a duplicate.0 -
Robert Wren said: From the original post: "Somehow while doing this I inadvertently deleted their entire package of sources from the initial transfer from FamilySearch."
I'm wondering how that could possibly have happened in MyHeritage??? I haven't noticed anything there that could allow that to happen?? That question needs to be answered (and corrected) by MyH.
The OP also stated " I had absolutely no idea that MyHeritage's version of a person's data is considered the primary source in this syncing process." I believe that is incorrect & FS is the 'primary source' but changes made in MyH will change the FSTree PID.0 -
joe martel said: If there is a conflict of data (say after MH grabbed the data and it changed on FS) then FS always wins on the MH sync.0
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Roger Moritz said: Well better to just go and ahead and attach them, even if a few duplicate. People will go back and clean that up. I would say add them all, and it will sort out.0
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Roger Moritz said: And thank you for staying on top of it.0
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jimmy.zimmerman said: >> "I'm wondering how that could possibly have happened in MyHeritage??? I haven't noticed anything there that could allow that to happen?? That question needs to be answered (and corrected) by MyH."
MyHeritage has done that, but I'm not going to detail the steps here. MyHeritage is putting the safeguards to keep it from happening again in the future. (see my earlier post)0 -
Robert Wren said: OK, good to hear - and great job in repairing it all!!!!0
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jimmy.zimmerman said: All the remaining sources have been restored. FYI, 870 sources were reattached by the community through hints and source linker. The remaining 766 sources which had been detached are now restored. We are now at 100% sources restored.
Also, MyHeritage has reported great progress on implementing the plan to prevent this from happening again. I expect the sync to be available again soon.0 -
JT said: Thank you Brother Zimmerman !!
(Just in time for Rootstech)0 -
jimmy.zimmerman said: MyHeritage has completed the implementation and has opened sync again.0
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Kathryn Grant said: Again, Jimmy, THANK YOU for addressing this problem so quickly and effectively. Major kudos! It's a great example of how FamilySearch really cares about its users.0
This discussion has been closed.