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I understand from recent discussion that moderators may be able to see users' registration email addresses, e.g., when sending out warnings.

  1. What permanent user information (email, login IDs, etc) can be viewed by moderators?

  2. What session-dependent user information is visible to moderators (who is logged in, postings currently being read, edits in progress, etc)?

  3. Can any of the high-reputation users view that information?

  4. What are the answers to these questions for MO and MO.meta? I cannot actually ask this question on MO.meta because, due to exactly these privacy concerns, I did not complete the application for the meta (MO differs from SE in not allowing automatic posting access in meta past a certain number of reputation points).

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  • $\begingroup$ As far as I know, high-rep users can't view any user data that low-rep users can't. The only thing we get access to is the tools menu (the capacities of which are well-documented... somewhere) and the ability to see deleted posts. $\endgroup$
    – Qiaochu Yuan
    Commented Sep 28, 2010 at 14:56
  • $\begingroup$ @Qiaochu, is that also the case for MO? (I can see it is the case for math.SE beta with 2k+, but I am below 10K on MO and cannot check.) $\endgroup$
    – T..
    Commented Sep 28, 2010 at 15:05
  • $\begingroup$ @T..: yep (again, as far as I know). The tools menu, besides letting you see deleted posts and offensive/spam flags, is just a way to aggregate certain bits of public information. $\endgroup$
    – Qiaochu Yuan
    Commented Sep 28, 2010 at 15:38
  • $\begingroup$ What is available to high-rep users can be found here. Also of interest may be the site's privacy policy, available from the 'legal' link at the bottom of the page. $\endgroup$
    – Larry Wang
    Commented Sep 30, 2010 at 10:06
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    $\begingroup$ @Kaestur: what additional information is available to you as a moderator? $\endgroup$
    – T..
    Commented Sep 30, 2010 at 19:21
  • $\begingroup$ The moderators on meta.MO can't see anything about you. meta.MO runs on a completely different server and doesn't require a valid e-mail address to post. Similarly, moderators on MO can't see your e-mail address unless you filled in the "e-mail address" box in the profile page on MO. $\endgroup$
    – 97832123
    Commented Oct 2, 2010 at 18:50

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The extra info that moderators can view are your email address and real name, if you have filled them in. These are mainly used for private contact between you and us.

We can also check registered your OpenIDs, and time and IP addresses when you access the site, and vote count between 2 users, so e.g. we could identify sock puppets.

These info are visible only to you and the moderators.

Moderators cannot see what post you have read, what entry you are typing, what flags and votes you have cast to a post / comment etc.

As commented by Kaestur, information available to high-rep users can be found in the MSO post What are the moderation tools available to high-reputation users?. You may also want to read the Stack Exchange Network's Privacy Policy.

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