Caught red-handed: Reddit CEO edited comments that disparaged him

If you leave a comment on a website you expect one of two things. First, and most likely, is for your comment to be left alone and posted as-is. The second possibility is that you might find your comment has been deleted because of violating site terms. Reddit, however, has a third option.

The self-styled 'front page of the internet' is a little red-faced after CEO Steve Huffman admitted editing comments that were critical of him. Posting using the name 'spez', Huffman was able to anonymously edit comments and replace references to his name with those of Reddit moderators.

Huffman was accused of editing comments left on the pro-Trump r/the_donald subreddit, and he has now admitted to the misconduct. The admission was met with complaints, calls for Huffman's resignation, and questions about whether there could have been other instances of anonymous comment editing.

Holding his hands up to the accusations, Huffman says:

Hey Everyone,

Yep. I messed with the "fuck u/spez" comments, replacing "spez" with r/the_donald mods for about an hour. It's been a long week here trying to unwind the r/pizzagate stuff. As much as we try to maintain a good relationship with you all, it does get old getting called a pedophile constantly. As the CEO, I shouldn’t play such games, and it’s all fixed now. Our community team is pretty pissed at me, so I most assuredly won’t do this again.

Fuck u/spez.

The admission will undoubtedly be seen as an attempt to curry favor with a disillusioned userbase, but the comments show that it has served only to raise further suspicions rather than allaying fears. As redditor up_coats1 says:

This calls into question all of reddit's security protocols. How many other reddit employees have root level access to the database, and are able to make any change without consulting with another employee? We don't know. That means there could be any number of rogue employees running around and shadow editing comments, shadow banning people, etc., and we would have no way to prove it.

Image credit: Gil C / Shutterstock