Wikipedia page of Yasir Hussain ‘vandalised heavily’ during past week, says Pakistan-based editor

KARACHI: Actor Yasir Hussain’s Wikipedia page has been “locked” for editing after it was “vandalised heavily” in the last week, during which prominent Turkish actress Esra Bilgic was mentioned as his parent, a Pakistan-based editor of the popular online encyclopedia told The News    Sunday.

Not only this, but Yasir's birthdate and birthplace were also changed.

Pakistani internet users were surprised recently to see Google search results showing Ertugrul-famed Esra Bilgic as her parent. It was later found that the information was actually sourced from Wikipedia and the search engine has nothing to do with it.

Saqib Qayyum, who works on a voluntary basis for the website, said “no idea why but his bio page was heavily vandalised past week but page is locked now”.

He said, “someone (now permanently blocked) added Esra as his mother on 6th October but  unfortunately the change went unnoticed and after it was rectified last week, further vandalism began”.

Qayyum, considered by the foreign media as a “prominent Wikipedia editor from Pakistan”, noted that the updates went unnoticed because of lack of editors from the country.

The page log shared by the editor shows multiple entries from unknown accounts.

“In one instance, someone even tried to incorporate Ertugrul’s Engin Altan Düzyatan as Yasir's father, and Marvi Sirmed and Aziz Mian Qawwal as his spouse.”

Since the website is accessible for everyone and anyone can edit the pages, hundreds of changes are made on a regular basis. “This is not unusual,” he underscored.

Someone even tried mentioning porn star Dani Daniels as  his spouse, he said.

The actor's Wikipedia page has been updated with the correct information but due to some unknown reason Google is still showing the same results.

Yasir responds

Yasir Hussain, famous for his witty and quirky responses on social media, is not bothered at all by this trolling.

While responding to a question, the actor said that it happened months ago when he commented on the Turkish actors.

“I don’t know what is wrong with people and I don’t believe in pages like Wikipedia where you can go and change data according to your mental health I don’t know what is it on about you or anyone else it is not that important I think for me.”

“These controversies don’t bother me.”