Vandalism reports

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This is an archived version of this page, as edited by Yosri (talk | contribs) at 17:06, 27 September 2013 (→‎User:Alvarosevilladesign). It may differ significantly from the current version.
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Before reporting, please take note of the following premises:
Most Wikimedia wikis are able to deal with vandalism on their own. This page is intended only for certain reports
Reporting requirements
  • The username(s) or IP address(es) of the offenders.
  • A description of their vandalism (spamming, adding junk, removing legitimate text, etc), preferably with diffs to examples.
  • The Wikimedia wikis affected.
  • Suggestions for monitoring strategies, blocks etc.

When reporting please use informative headings like: 

=== username(s), IP address ===
*{{luxotool|IP address}} <!-- for IP addresses -->
*{{sultool|Username}} <!-- for usernames -->
Description, evidence, diffs, etc. --~~~~
Note on spam
  • If the spamming is cross-wiki, malware sites, repeated or severe, please report it to the spam blacklist.
Related pages
Notice

If the username is clearly offensive, libellous or contains private information do NOT post it here. Email the private OTRS queue for stewards: stewards@wikimedia.org - Thank you.

Archives & subpages
Cross-wiki requests
Meta-Wiki requests

Current cross-wiki vandalism

Please place new reports at the top of this section. Thank you.

en:ScotXW

Hi, I don't think a global block would be warranted at this point, but could one of you at least please inform this user that his cross wiki spamming of images with text and captions in English is unlikely to be appreciated on non-English projects? After several warnings he has been blocked for doing that on nl:wiki. See Luxo's. Thanks in advance and regards, Wutsje (talk) 01:51, 26 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is neither vandalism nor something one would normally be globally blocked for, unless done after multiple warnings, especially since global blocks only apply to IPs. I do agree that the user should refrain from adding this English content, but I'm sure we can reach an agreement rather than block him. Anyway, I'll notify him of this discussion on enwiki and Meta. PiRSquared17 (talk) 01:56, 26 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
FYI: he has been requested on several projects not to do this. I do however agree that this is not a matter of bad faith, that's why I just asked to point out to him that uploading English content on non-English projects is not likely to be widely appreciated. Wutsje (talk) 02:24, 26 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
While I very much agree that English captions do not look good, you also have to agree, that it is a very effective method to get things done. Besides making and quoting rules ..., you surely agree, that many articles are miserably written, not nearly comprehensive and: they lack diagrams and illustrations that further visualize the context. When any suitable diagram becomes available under an acceptable license to wikimedia commons, that is maximum BY-SA, BY-SA-ND or BY-NC are not considered "free" enough, this diagram should be added to articles, ASAP, instad of atfer 6 years. To make the articles better, and maybe even to stimulate people to write a couple of lines.
The possible methods to add new content quickly I see, are:
Add the diagram to the "right" category, and hope that people will bother to look through the categories, spot suitable content, add it to articles and write a good caption.
Add the diagram without (English) caption to other articles, and wait until someones bother to merely write a caption (for some reasons I do not fully comprehend, that can take several weeks to months, do you know why?)
Add the diagram with an English caption, and let somebody else translate it.
I see two arguments that have to be weighted against each other. The one being, that it looks bad to have English language captions in a non-English article, the other being, that diagrams are sparse and so are contributors (who contribute knowledge and "content" rather than quotations of rules). ScotXW (talk) 08:08, 26 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"Add the diagram without (English) caption to other articles, and wait until someones bother to merely write a caption (for some reasons I do not fully comprehend, that can take several weeks to months, do you know why?)". It's likely because some projects have very few active editors and even fewer who can translate QuiteUnusual (talk) 08:40, 26 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
If you have any specific languages in mind, I can try to get a translation of some specific text for you. (i.e., by asking embassy) PiRSquared17 (talk) 15:11, 26 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
@ScotXW: you state I have to agree that this is a very effective way to get things done, but I don't. I don't think it very effective when a Dutch reader visits a Dutch page and finds your image with English labels and an English caption. And even if you don't understand why I think this is very ineffective, you've been asked to stop adding your own image with an English caption to Dutch articles. That should have been enough for you to refrain from continuing but apparently it wasn't. You "excuse" yourself by stating that many articles are "miserably written" but it's obvious you can't judge the quality of articles in foreign languages; you're not even capable of coining a caption in a foreign language. Moreover, a miserably written article doesn't become excellent, just because you add some diagram that's incomprehensible for someone who doesn't read English. And you may be convinced you made a very fine diagram, it's not up to you to decide it should be addad ASAP in contexts you don't understand. Just add your image to the English article, place it in the appropriate category on Commons, maybe add a note to the talk page of corresponding articles in some foreign languages and hope some English reading editor will take notice. It's not as if Wikipedia becomes a bad place just because not every article shows your image. I think you're overestimating yourself. The bottomline however is that if you are urged to stop some behaviour because it is not appreciated on a specific project, and you don't act upon it, you're not fit for contributing in a project that's all about cooperation. Because you refused to listen to reason, your account had been locked on the Dutch Wikipedia. Wikiklaas (talk) 16:07, 26 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
@PiRSquared17 thank you for the link, I'll see what this ca do for me.
@Wikiklaas you articulate nicely, but I stopped couting the specious arguments and logic mistakes at 2. Besides the fact, that you can block me, you presented no agrument at all. E.g. in case an illustration does not fit the page, remove it. In case you have a better diagram, please, by all means replace the one I contributed with the better one. Neither did happen. I would not call this contructive at all, because it aint. Good day to you ScotXW (talk) 09:23, 27 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Long-term, recurrent vandalism

See the archives

User:Alvarosevilladesign

Alvarosevilladesign [stalktoy] – [cross-wiki edits]

I have originally started an inquiry at Commons:Administrators' noticeboard/User problems: Widespread spamming by a photographer, but it seems that this place suits better. Please look there to find a longer version, links and evidence.

Short version: Commons user Alvarosevilladesign (the creation of his own personal en.wp article David Adam Kess has been rejected) is a sock puppet of Ilovetosurfthewaves [stalktoy] – [cross-wiki edits], Daytonarolexboston [stalktoy] – [cross-wiki edits] and Bonsairolex [stalktoy] – [cross-wiki edits], all of them blocked in en.wp. Further sock puppets have been confirmed in 2011, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Bonsairolex/Archive. He's a photographer who has uploaded hundreds of photographs to commons (that's fine), and he's also a SEO. This version of his commons user page includes a link to his SEO site. There you'll find a testimonial page (http... internetsearchoptimization.webs.com/apps/testimonials/ - I saved it to my computer, in case he deletes it) from which you can gather that he created, with his older accounts now blocked, articles like en:Surfing in Ecuador, en:Waltham Model 1857, and others in an SEO context. I came across his activities when I noticed lots of his photographs in top categories of Commons rather than in the most appropriate cats further down the tree. Then I noticed that a number of his pictures are also placed in many (30, 50 or more) local wikipedias, although there are better, higher resolution images available or his images were inappropriate or redundant. (Examples: global use of [1], [2], [3]) My conviction is that he spams his pictures in order to increase their search engine rankings. He has shown the same behaviour with his account Daytonarolexboston, see e.g. this file. Blocking his account won't stop him from spamming his pictures all over local Wikipedias that have few editors to control him, since spamming is done by IPs from his host country Ecuador (example). Is there anything that can be done about this? How can we make sure that multiple local projects dont become a playground for SEOs? --Sitacuisses (talk) 03:13, 25 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I believe SEO doesn't work at Wikipedia, due to nonfollow global tagging. So what is wrong, him putting his picture where there is no picture before this, as long as he did not replace a better picture with his? Yosri (talk) 17:06, 27 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]
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