Write, edit, verify: Everything you need to know about how Wikipedia works

Wikipedia was founded by Jimmy Wales in 2001 and is largely supported by the Wikimedia Foundation

After India's five-wicket defeat to Pakistan on Sunday, fast bowler Arshdeep Singh was criticised heavily on Twitter. Later that night, the Wikipedia page about him was edited by unknown miscreants. It read that Singh had been selected to play for the "Khalistan" national cricket team.

Wikipedia later restored the page. However, the ministry of electronics and information technology will reportedly issue summons to the Wikimedia Foundation, the website's owners. An explanation of the checks and balances put in place by the website will be sought.

What is Wikipedia?

Wikipedia is a not-for-profit multilingual website that works as an online encyclopedia. It was founded by Jimmy Wales in 2001 and is largely supported by the Wikimedia Foundation.

Who can write and edit the content on Wikipedia?

Anyone can write or edit the content on the website.

"Yes, anyone can be bold and edit an existing article or create a new one, and volunteers do not need to have any formal training. The people who create and edit articles on Wikipedia come from many countries, with individuals who all bring something different with them, but most importantly a willingness to help," its website read.

Currently, the website has over 44 million registered users.

Does it have any checks and balances?

"Wikipedia has a set of policies and quality control processes. Editors can patrol changes as they happen, monitor specific topics of interest, follow a user's track of contributions, tag problematic articles for further review, report vandals, discuss the merits of each article with other users, and much more," its website states.

It further said that if a change is unsourced or an editor's opinion, it can be removed from the website. Also, if required, the old version can be restored.

In the case of Singh, the old version of the page was restored, but according to a report by Economic Times (ET), the government will ask the executives of the company how the edit was allowed to stay on for "quite some time."

It is also reported that the edits have been traced back to servers in "neighbouring countries". It can cause damage to India's internal peace, ET quoted officials as saying.

What happens if a user puts up false information?

According to the website's rules, if a user is found misbehaving or putting up false information repeatedly, the account can be suspended. The user will not be able to make another account from the same IP address again.