Use of Wiki systems in Archaeology: Privacy, security and data protection as key problems

Wikis are powerful, collaborative tools and can be used for educational purposes in many ways. The original idea of a Wiki is to make information accessible to all. However, it is very interesting that experiences in the use of Wikis in educational settings showed that security and data protection of wiki contents is definitely an issue. In this paper, we discuss problems and solutions on the basis of use cases from archaeological education. Interestingly, archaeologists are extremely worried about online accessible information due to the serious danger of archaeological looting. “Tomb raiders”, i.e. people who excavate artefacts of cultural heritage on the basis of information stored in Geowikis, so called archaeological looters, are not aware of the value of cultural heritage, are interested only in the artefacts and destroying the cultural context, which is of enormous interest for archaeological research. Consequently, the protection of archaeological information is one of the most urgent tasks in the preservation of cultural heritage.