They aren't naming the designers of the software, the devs who implemented it, or any number of other middle managers and other folks involved in building it and maintaining it. Just these 3 unfortunate individuals who failed to use it properly...
Seems like it works for design as well.
The blame rests on the software vendor who built such an atrocious product and decision makers at Citibank who chose that software, in my opinion.
Just because their names are relevant to the court case doesn't mean they are relevant to readers of an article reporting on that court case - especially when that article doesn't even bother to identify the court case itself or the software vendor implied by the article to be responsible for the root cause of the matter.
The court case is public record.
The court case itself is not in the first five pages of results.
Mentioning the name in this context links this person to one event which arguably isn't even their fault.
This has real consequences for this person in terms of professional reputation alone.
Both laziness and foolishness are in ample abundance, so the two men now will have to live out their lives marred in this scandal for no good reason.
Had the names been withheld the same lazy fools would run out of their attention span before they could find the names in the court papers.
The UI bug and the impact is interesting, but the names of the individuals or where they are from add no value to this article.
It does indeed mention the names, even in this version from yesterday.
If the intent is to just provide the reader with more relevant information, surely the identity of the development firm behind Flexcube would be more relevant. Again, that information is conspicuously absent. It seems Flexcube was developed and distributed by Oracle.
If this sort of behavior is the result of "journalistic standards", then maybe it's time for those standards to be revised.
That said - if people want to yell, so what?
The information is drawn from public court documents and the incident is something with nearly a billion dollars in consequences that affects multiple publicly traded companies.
What do people think the word "news" means if not this?
But who cares that Citi lost half a billion dollars because of an interface mistake?
The latter is news. The former is not. The story loses none of its impact or relevancy leaving the names out.
Also, it's possible to reach out to Fratta and ask for comment beforehand - then you can either include that response, or lack of response, without naming them.
If Vincent Fratta is alleged to have urinated in a public park and gets arrested for it that's public information, and those kind of things often end up in police blotters, even if the charges are later dropped. If Vincent Fratta is overwhelmed by medical debt and files for bankruptcy that's in the public record as well.
But we should concern ourselves with Vincent Fratta's privacy when he botches a financial transaction in a way that has hundreds of millions of dollars in consequences for public companies and involves an interesting and newsworthy legal precedent?
Are you the judge to rule whether the individual has lost his right of privacy?
Yet you comment here under a pseudonym. What if you made a mistake, would you want to be named?
I mean, there is an actual judge. This is a major legal case, and they've placed the info in the public record. The judge has in fact made a ruling.
I'm not saying it's always a perfect system, but it's definitely a very well established system in the U.S. that all court proceedings are very public. It's one of the core founding principles of the judicial branch, and it's also been a staple of American journalism for hundreds of years.
I personally think the European approach is much better on this specific issue, and that right to be forgotten laws and similar are justified.
But the reason I mentioned it in this context is that the idea that journalists naming people who are clearly notable in the context of reporting news only seems to generate a critical response when it's someone that the average HN reader identifies with.
And just because you can name the persons, doesn't mean you should.
It's different, if person is caught doing something illegal, that his name does add to the story.
But this was just big oopsie, and individuals did nothing wrong. (or you can bet, Citibank would try do divert blame on them)
Not really. In Germany it's very uncommon to name individuals in news reports, even in murder cases. If at all the format used is Angela M.
There is always a balance between the 'personality rights' of the individual and the public's right of information.
The story here is a good example - there is zero need to know the individuals' names.
You don’t actually say what this thing we’re supposed to understand is, but I think you’re implying that it’s in the public’s interest to know it? If that’s what you meant, I’d disagree that these names are in the public interest.
Sure, their names are “news” but how does the name of someone who made an innocent mistake help me understand the news? What’s the value-add? The “ROI” seems in strongly negative territory here.
Naming the developers who wrote this and signed off on it, now that might be more relevant.
When pressed they'll blab some indefensible nonsense about their duty as a journalist, which apparently includes throwing innocent people under the bus with a flourish.
I’ve got no sympathy for Citi and the litany of penny-pinching that created the situation. And I loathe that their first reaction was probably to require ANOTHER layer of bureaucratic approval. But I don’t find any value in embarrassing the people who pressed the buttons.
This is the same reason that NTSB reports are fun to read: you know that you're not just wasting your time with someone's imagination.
The public knowledge of their names also has positive impact in their circle of friends. Like, for example, now all their friends know that Oracle is a trigger to them and shouldn't be mentioned. It's a win-win-win: Society is entertained, the people named avoid getting triggered, and the friends avoid mentioning uncomfortable topics, triggering them.
1st, this isn't a movie. getting entertainment from a real life person's drama can be inappropriate and dystopian in certain contexts, and this very well looks like it could be one of those contexts.
2nd, if an individual chooses they can share this story with their friends. an individual could feel very ashamed/embarrassed, and this comes across like the media airing their dirty laundry. it could really injure someone psychologically.
3rd, they only mentioned the Indian man's name but not the guy from Delaware which comes across as borderline racist.
Anyway it appears they took the names down from the article.
Nobody is saying they aren't allowed to publish the information. Tabloids exist and can say whatever they want, but a serious outlet like Ars is held to higher standards by their customers. I assume Ars removed the names because they agreed those details were unnecessary and only served as a potential liability for those named.
Free speech means the freedom to say or not say what you want. Ars chose to not say something of their own volition.
Ars censored themselves. It's the chilling effect against free speech in action.
Ars clearly wanted to say it, which is why they published what they originally did. However, because of the chilling effect, they felt the need to go back and retroactively censor themselves even if they didn't want to.
> Citibank's procedures require that three people sign off on a transaction of this size. In this case, that was Raj, a colleague of his in India, and a senior Citibank official in Delaware named Vincent Fratta.
The names of these individuals seems like an unnecessary detail, especially since the article names the software interface as the culprit. I can't help but think about the recent NYT/SSC incident.