Wikimedia Meta-Wiki

Requests for comment/Global ban for Avoided

< Requests for comment

The following request for comments is closed. From a numerical point of view there's a significant consensus to ban, even more if taking into account the temporal evolution of the discussion. Notwithstanding this, most of opposition is based upon the assumption no abuses happened out of de.wiki: this or this are counter-evidences which I draw by myself, without considering any previous check. For all these reasons I am closing this request as successful, implementing its outcome by locking Avoided and adding their username to the list of globally banned users. --Vituzzu (talk) 18:34, 31 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statements

Statement by Liberaler Humanist

I hereby request, that the WMF may issue a global ban against the owner of the Account User:Avoided and persue legal measures to keep this person away from all projects for the following reasons:

  • The user is a long-term vandal who is spamming newly registrated accounts. The names of those accounts usually contain violent phantasies or threats.
  • The user is engaging in long-term harassment of several other users. The names of his accounts often contain threats of violence against named users.
  • According to the checkuser results in the German Wikipedia, the user in question of this request appears to be turning into a one (or unlikely: two) man terror group. In the last few months, he has threatened minors with no apparent connection to any project, threatened teachers and has posted a threat of commiting an act of violence in the school these minors attend. In a number of cases, he has tried to commit identity theft. The presumption of innocence applies to Avoided for all the acts mentioned in this paragraph.

Formal comment

The Global ban policy sets the following requirements for a global ban:

  • The user demonstrates an ongoing pattern of cross-wiki abuse that is not merely vandalism or spam. - While the focus of his abuse lies on the German Wikipedia, there were a number of sockpuppets on Commons and in the English Wikipedia. A further comment detailing the cross-wiki abuse was added at the end of this chapter after the start of the request.
  • The user has been carefully informed about appropriate participation in the projects and has had fair opportunity to rectify any problems. - The German Wikipedia has tried everything in order to deal with this user. Neither the internal conflict resolution nor the Checkuser trial nor the banning of his thousands of sockpuppets could make him realize, that he was violating rules.
  • The user is indefinitely blocked or banned on two or more projects. - Avoided is banned from the German Wikipedia and Commons.

Avoided was notified about this request. He did not answer, but a few minutes after the notification, he started registrating typical sockpuppets, i.e. this one.

Added after the start of the request: Regarding the cross-wiki abuse: Avoided has focussed on communicating his messages via the the names of his accounts which appear in the logbook of newly registrated accounts. In several cases, Avoided used the automatic account creation to get the logbooks for newly registered accounts of other projects. Examples for this sort of spam are: [1], [2], [3], [4]. In the column "method", information on the registration method is given. While accounts on Meta, Loginwiki and mediawiki.org are automatically created, the user had to visit any of the projects for which "created on login" appears after hoovering the mouse over the question mark in the "method"-column. The plus in the green circle indicates, where the user had registered his account. In some cases, i.e. this one, Avoided has registered his accounts in other projects than DEWP, i.e. this one. DerHexer has given examples of accounts, that started editing in other projects than DEWP below.


The question of the required extent of cross-wiki-vandalism was raised by various users. However, the Global Ban Policy does not set a required level of cross-wiki-activity. In the case of the global ban request against Messina, the concern, that Messina was mainly an issue in WPDE was raised as well but was ultimately not considered a reason against the global ban. Appart from the three main criteria, the global ban policy also lists a number of reasons for which global bans were requested in the past and which are - in the context of the site- apparently reasons for a global ban. Among these are: "Harassing or threatening contributors to the projects, on- or off-wiki", "Serious on-wiki fraud or identity theft that is not simple abuse of multiple accounts". These are obviously issues in this case. But even if we do not consider Avoided to be a cross-wiki-problem, there is still the issue, that something needs to be done to sustainably stop his harassment of users and people not affiliated with any project. No meassure that is available to the administrators took effect, therefore something needs to be done on to stop this series of harassment, that is far worse than what every other vandal has been doing.

I have discussed the issue and possible solutions with various, very helpfull staff of Wikimedia. Their advice was, that a global ban is the requirement for Wikimedia to consider further steps against a User. This request was in fact not made not made to make banning Avoideds sockpuppets easier, this is not the problem. The purpose of this request is getting the WMF to take legal steps against Avoided in the real world, which may be able to stop his activities.

This is not correct. He was checkusered on enwiki more than one time, on elwiki, frwiki, frwiktionary, loginwiki, and dewiki as stated in the first CheckUser request. —DerHexer (Talk) 00:39, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Historic summary

From 2005 to 2009, a vandal acting under the name „Diesel“ was spreading right extremist propaganda, fecal phantasies and general harassament. Avoided registered in 2007 and took the role of a vandal fighter. He ran three times for an administrators office – he lost the second election by a four/two votes – and at some point turned into a vandal by taking the roles of Dieselvandale and creating the vandal-identities „Username-/Stalkertroll“ and „Cavetroll“. In 2014, a Checkuser trial, processed on several abused wikis including dewiki, enwiki, elwiki, frwiki, frwiktionary, was able to prove the extent of his vandalism. As Avoided did not stop disturbing Wikipedia, a total of 36 Checkuser trials with several thousand abusive accounts were carried out (Part 2, Part 3), not all of them could be clearly connected with his main account which is, in fact, technically impossible after such a long time. Despite being banned from the German Wikipedia in 2014, he briefly returned to the English Wikipedia in July 2016 and saved about 2.600 edits in December 2017.

Evidence

Due to personality rights of persons, both registered users and persons not registered at any Wikimedia project, it is not possible to discuss most edits Avoided has commited in detail. If necessary, A list of edits regarding the threats against a School in November 2017 has been sent to various Wikimedia staff. If necessary, this list can be sent to the staff responsible for handling such requests along with further information regarding this case. All of Avoideds harassing and disturbing usernames can be found in the Checkuser trials.

The Checkuser trials have found and documented a vast amount of information on the technical details on Avoideds access to the internet. To my understanding as well as the administrators consensus, it is prooven beyond doubt, that all the actions credited to the Avoided-sockpuppetry can be traced back to the owner of the account Avoided. The Checkuser trials seem to be very accurate, as they have never listed an account of another troll operating from a range Avoided uses, i.e. „Yukterez“. Avoided mostly uses Austrian IP adresses. However, a small part of his edit was done using german adresses. According to a comment on the discussion page of the third part of the Checkuser trials against him, Avoided has recently claimed that neither he nor „Diesel11“ were responsible for some edits. This seems to suggest, that Avoided claims to cooperate with the original „Dieselvandale“. It is not possible to disproove such claims. Should further investigations find, that a second person is involved into these actions, the proposed measures should be executed against both of these persons. This case is however unlikely, as Avoided has denied everything and kept making up explanations that are supposed to exonerate him.

Conclusion

The case has been discussed with a number of users and Wikimedia staff. There seems to be a consensus for a principal consensus for a global ban. While threats and harassment against Users are not that rare, there have been few cases of someone abusing Wikipedia to make threats against persons not affiliated to any project. Wikimedia needs to take preventive measures to keep this person away. If Avoided should decide to conduct an attack on a public institution, Wikimedia could suffer damage to its image and therefore a loss in donations if the public should become aware that he has been using Wikipedia to develop or proclaim his violent phantasies.

A global ban does not keep a user away out of its own. In Addition to a global ban, I therefore request, that the WMF should take legal measures against Avoided to prevent him from ever registering an Account or doing any edit on any Wikimedia project again. Since 2014, Everything was tried, but nothing could keep him away. Trolls usually get bored after a few years and leave on their own. Despite all efforts against him, Avoided turned from a nuisance into a threat against users and public safety. As his activities are intolerable and bind too much ressources, something new needs to be tried against him. – Liberaler Humanist (talk) 21:24, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Avoided

There is so much perfect falsehood Liberarer Humanist is writing about me. I'm not even Austrian and I've never threatened any schools. How naive can you be believing that one person was responsible for all the evil in a project as big as Wikipedia? I believe that the situation has changed a little since the introduction of pending changes, thus forcing trolls to resort to other means and ways of trolling, i.e. account creation. Nothing will change with this simple-minded attitude you people display. According to your reactions, virtually anyone in the world who creates some silly accounts is off the hook cause it is believed by default that he can only be me. I have never done any major harm to the English wikipedia and I don't even intend to. However, it seems as if you people were looking for some easy solutions and for one culprit that everything can be attributed to. In fact, it is a hydra that you are dealing with, it isn't only Diesel, Schniggendillertroll, Höhlentroll or me.

Humanist wrote: This case is however unlikely, as Avoided has denied everything and kept making up explanations that are supposed to exonerate him.

Wrong: I stated that some names were indeed created by me.

As far as account creations on enwiki are concerned, I can confirm that I gave birth to User:Klosteinwerfer years ago, editing Hexer's discussion page once. However, how are these accounts mine?

These are only some poins that I've quickly addressed. I have no difficulties with telling you the truth here since I have nothing to lose anyway. I indeed made use of personal attacks against THWZ, for example, that you still could use to take legal actions against me. However, I am still wondering how I succeeded at becoming such a big deal in terms of being the culprit behind almost everything. As if one regular person had access to more than a dozen of different ranges on a daily basis. --Avoided (talk) 16:23, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

For your information: Local Checkuser investigation on the English Wikipedia could not confirm that those accounts listed belong to me, thus giving no evidence to the claim of widespread cross-wikipedia vandalism and abusive global account creation. --Avoided (talk) 00:35, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Vote

Support

  1. —viciarg414 22:04, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Hilarmont (talk) 22:05, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  3. --1971markus (talk) 22:10, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Braveheart (talk) 22:46, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Support --Morten Haan (talk) 23:51, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Support Support If official staff takes the point of view that a global ban is a prerequisite for more "kinetic" actions, I'd understand that this may mean e.g. a cease and desist order, then casting a supporting vote is a sound thing. Grand-Duc (talk) 00:24, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  7. -- oh yes. Marcus Cyron (talk) 02:54, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  8. --Mirer (talk) 04:19, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  9. Strong Support --Holder (talk) 07:01, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  10. --Michileo (talk) 08:42, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  11. -- Squasher (talk) 10:02, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  12. -- O.Koslowski (talk) 10:18, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Mupa280868 (talk) 10:50, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Bernhard Wallisch 12:02, 5 January 2018 (UTC) Some things are not really clear-cut. Best regards, Bernhard Wallisch 10:29, 9 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  14. --Tönjes (talk) 12:09, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  15. --Hannes 24 (talk) 14:54, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  16. --M-J (talk) 15:56, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  17. Strong support Strong support Even if he was banned on dewiki a long time ago, he is still nerving. As someone who normaly is on Vandal patrol i sometimes check che local Account creation log and the account names he uses for block evading are there usally every day. Victor Schmidt (talk) 16:00, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  18. --თოგო (D) 17:32, 5 January 2018 (UTC) looks like a textbook case for a g-ban to me.[reply]
  19. Support Support --Cimbail (talk) 17:51, 5 January 2018 (UTC) Don't know where to check if I am allowed to vote on meta. Apologies to those who clean up the mess, if I'm not.[reply]
  20. Support Support. Even if he was falsely accused for some accounts: he admitted the creation of tons of abusive accounts, see 1 and 2. --Engie (talk) 18:18, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  21. → «« Man77 »» [de] 18:33, 5 January 2018 (UTC) Thanks to this school incident I, however, do not understand why there is no ban by WMF already.[reply]
  22. Support Support Users like this does not belong here -ArdiPras95 (talk) 18:56, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  23. --Louis Wu (talk) 19:30, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  24. --Superbass (talk) 20:02, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  25. Support Support -- Ra'ike (talk) 23:37, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  26. Support Support If you expect to make thousands of sockpuppets that get discovered with bad usernames and potentially threaten the safety of a project member/project members then you are very mistaken. I think the user may even be eligible for a WMF ban since they may have violated the Terms of Service --Sau226 (talk) 00:30, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  27. Support Support Grüße vom Sänger ♫(Reden) 00:54, 6 January 2018 (UTC) Wenn es denn tatsächlich eines solchen Verfahrens bedarf, damit die WMF gegen diesen Hypertroll agiert, dann halt hier.[reply]
  28. Grueslayer (talk) 09:18, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  29. --Ghilt (talk) 12:54, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  30. Support Support as of the project's self-respect --Sargoth (talk) 13:08, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  31. Support Support unacceptable behaviour for the whole project. --Kuebi (talk) 14:51, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  32. Support Support XenonX3 (talk) 17:29, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  33. Support Support, the Gunslinger 18:24, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  34. Support Support --Count Count (talk) 20:25, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  35. --Gridditsch (talk) 20:52, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  36. --Björn Hagemann (talk) 22:33, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  37. Strong support Strong support --Neozoon (talk) 00:43, 7 January 2018 (UTC) The actions of this persons are way beyond what is bearable, the combination of announcing gruesome violent acts against named Wikipedians needs to be taken seriously, this is for sure not normal behaviour[reply]
    Not true. I didn't threat any schools nor did I accounce violent acts against Wikipedians. As I said, they've started to connect all possible silly user names to me. DerHexer gave his opinion of very likely to be Avoided, which is not beyond reasonable doubt. Those accounts who really did those severe threats could not be linked directly to my account whatsoever. Where Hexer assessed accounts to be mine, English checkuser investigation found nothing. --Avoided (talk) 12:30, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Only one counter example: Here you threatened a user and admins to punch their faces. --Engie (talk) 13:12, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Important word is here. As if it was possible to hit people through the internet. Serious threats look way different. Btw: this is what a real threat looks like. This is hardcore, my dear. --Avoided (talk) 16:33, 18 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  38. Support Support what the hell, this is awful. Gamebuster (talk) 03:37, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  39. --Quotengrote (talk) 06:40, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  40. Support --Elmie (talk) 08:45, 8 January 2018 (UTC) Seems that the user does not want to work seriously but making trouble is its fortune[reply]
  41. Support Support  @xqt 09:06, 8 January 2018 (UTC) I guess this account creation filter (admins/stewards only) is enough.[reply]
  42. Support Support unacceptable behaviour for the whole project --Hic et nunc (talk) 11:00, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  43. --Kenny McFly (talk) 12:00, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  44. --Doc.Heintz (talk) 12:22, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  45. Support Support --Udo T. (talk) 16:21, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  46. — Elvaube ?! 18:51, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  47. Support Support -<(kmk)>- (talk) 21:24, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  48. --Sujalajus (talk) 11:53, 9 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  49. --He3nry (talk) 14:06, 9 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  50. --JWBE (talk) 16:20, 9 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    -<(kmk)>- (talk) 18:45, 9 January 2018 (UTC) user already voted.[reply]
  51. --Exoport (talk) 17:09, 10 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  52. --Millbart (talk) 21:46, 10 January 2018 (UTC) Obviously.[reply]
  53. --Eschenmoser (talk) 19:42, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  54. --Codc (talk) 22:23, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  55. -- Andreas Werle (talk) 05:48, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  56. Support Support No, Avoided is not "responsible for all the evil in a project as big as Wikipedia" (nobody stated that he is, btw). But he is definitely responsible for a vast quantity of account creations that are at least silly, but often vulgar, insulting and offending. One can argue that almost nobody will see these names ever again since they are buried in the logs, but I object. Wikipedia is one of the biggest and most famous websites. I worry about it’s reputation, if all we do is blocking and sometimes deleting/hiding content or usernames. I’m happy with this procedure regarding short-time vandals/trolls. But here, we have persistent trolling for years. Maybe it’s time for other procedures, and if WMF needs a preceding community-based global ban … Regardless what the catalyst for his "conversion" was, and regardless of the behaviour of the "other side": People like him should not be allowed to edit any Wikipedia --Schniggendiller (talk) 16:38, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  57. Support Support This should have been automatic the first time they threatened violence against another editor. Craig Franklin (talk) 10:22, 14 January 2018 (UTC).[reply]
  58. --Sabeth 01 (talk) 15:56, 14 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  59. Support Support -- Perrak (talk) 17:41, 14 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  60. Support Support There's nothing more to say. --SDKmac (talk) 19:35, 14 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  61. Support Support +1, nothing more to say. Yours, --Agathenon (talk) 20:33, 14 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  62. Support Support It is evident that Avoided has wasted everyone's time on a cross-wiki scale. Patient Zero (talk) 09:44, 15 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  63. Support Support enough is enough. Pia Gemova (talk) 20:05, 15 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  64. Support Support no need for this person in any Wikiproject in any form or shape.--Giftzwerg 88 (talk) 00:20, 17 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  65. Support Support --Lena1 (talk) 10:06, 17 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  66. Support Support I saw some of A.’s attacks against my good friend User:THWZ. I’m opposed to any further activity of this person, in any of the foundation’s projects. —MBq (talk) 22:06, 17 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  67. Support Support --WolfgangRieger (talk) 01:02, 18 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  68. Support Support --Jossi2 (talk) 14:42, 18 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  69. Support Support -- --Artix Kreiger (Message Wall) 16:04, 18 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  70. Support Support --Informationswiedergutmachung (talk) 18:32, 18 January 2018 (UTC) Other Wikiprojects should not be a safe harbour for perpetrators.[reply]
  71. Support Support Sorry for molesting the global community with a de.wp-centric issue, but any edit by Avoided is far more mplesting than this little RfC. --Harald Krichel (talk) 10:35, 19 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    What sort of a clever comment from u that I can refute with at least one recent edit. Please tell me how these edits (e.g. [5], [6]) are molesting? --Avoided (talk) 13:26, 19 January 2018 (UTC) [reply]
    Just imaging any edit of you would be like those … There wouldn't be a RfC. It was your decision not to. 91.60.13.237 17:17, 20 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    But I can't help myself! I have no power over this; this evil thing inside me, the fire, the voices, the torment! I want to escape, to escape from myself! But it's impossible! --Avoided (talk) 20:24, 22 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  72. Support Support --Otberg (talk) 20:46, 20 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  73. Support Support --Dr-Victor-von-Doom (talk) 22:47, 21 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  74. Support Support Billhpike (talk) 06:07, 23 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  75. Support Support Gamaliel (talk) 21:54, 25 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  76. --Jojhnjoy (talk) 23:44, 27 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  77. Support Support --Gerbil (talk) 16:04, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  78. Support Support --Septembermorgen (talk) 20:45, 29 January 2018 (UTC) Not sure, what the advantage compared to the current situation will be.[reply]

Oppose

--Codc (talk) 22:19, 4 January 2018 (UTC) Doesn't fullfill the policy for this prozess. He is only disturbing the deWP and mostly with improper usernames. Changing to support.[reply]
@Codc, Morten Haan, Sakra, and A.Savin: Please get your facts right. By looking at only few of his accounts, I found a lot of abuse on enwiki, too ([7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17]), but also on other wikis ([18]), including several abusive edits there. Furthermore, even in the first CheckUser case in 2014, evidence for global abuse was collected from at least five projects. Besides that, abusive account names are per se global and produce abusive log entries on several projects only by creation. —DerHexer (Talk) 23:35, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I don't prefer commenting the opposing side, but make a single exception. Avoided is not only disturbing the deWP, he is abusing the project on a criminal level (the presumption of innocence applies) in order to threaten people who are not affiliated with any Wikimedia project. An example only visible for Administrators under the deleted pages section can be found here: "goo+gl/F3AWPB" (replace the "#" for "."), the link will delete itself in 24 hours. The aim of this request is not to get his sockpuppets blocked faster, but to get WMF to take the necessary steps against him, i.e. by suing for injunction ("Unterlassungsklage") against his activities. I have discussed various ways of getting him to stop with Wikimedia staff and their advice was, that a global ban would be the requirement for any further steps. Even if this is not the formally correct proceeding, something still needs to be done against Avoided. If this should be to long, someone may as well put the whole comment into small brackets. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 23:46, 4 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Avoised has >20,000 edits on EN-WP and even an empty block log. If there was abuse on EN-WP, surely EN-WP would have blocked him too and this GB request was more plausible. --A.Savin (talk) 00:06, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Nice explanation but not factual: As stated in the first CheckUser request (Schließlich noch die Übereinstimmungen auf enwiki: Innerhalb von einer Stunde vandaliert Klosteinwerfer zunächst meine Diskussionsseite und Avoided entfernt einen anderen Beitrag auf eben dieser, zwar nicht mit gleicher IP, aber vom identischem System aus und beide unter der Haupt-Range 87.174.128.0/18. Eindeutige Übereinstimmung der IP finden wir wieder bei einer Bearbeitung von Avoided und den hiesigen Bearbeitungen von Haicpsoet (siehe gelöschte Beiträge).) he was also checkusered on enwiki where Haicpsoet, a troll account used on dewiki, was confirmed to be the same account as well as Klosteinwerfer who clearly vandalized enwiki. The CheckUser who did that action was very confident that he would immediately be global locked so that he did not create a local CheckUser request page nor created sock puppet categories but promised to proceed with administrative actions which is also stated in the first CheckUser request (die enwiki-Kollegen haben dies ebenfalls angekündigt). Apparently, that did not happen, for whatever reasons. The abuse is clear and backed up by crosswiki checkuser actions. A global ban is one conclusion that can be drawn. —DerHexer (Talk) 00:46, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
DerHexer has thankfully again provided an overview of the administrative proceedings. When looking at the timeline, it appears that Avoided tried to save his account by getting it out of attention. He was banned from DEWP in October 2013 after a violation of the "no personal attacks"-policy. The first checkuser trial against him was conducted on the 12th of January 2014. Avoided stopped editing on the english Wikipedia on the 14th of January 2014 after a User put the "confirmed sockpuppeteer"-template on his userpage. There was one edit in May 2014 and a series of ~20 edits in 2016. The last ~2.600 Edits were made after the 1st of December 2017. This was two weeks after i put the "confirmed sockpuppeteer"-template onto his userpage, which had disappeared in 2014. I don't know what he wants to tell us by returning in December 2017, but this return shows, that he didn't stop visiting ENWP, he rather kept loitering around without doing anything using his account. As his Account was inactive for most of the time, noone, who knew about his vandalism in DEWP could find any of his edits, identify him as a troll and report him. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 01:00, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  1. --Sakra (talk) 22:30, 4 January 2018 (UTC) Oppose cross-wiki abuse not verified[reply]
  2. --A.Savin (talk) 23:18, 4 January 2018 (UTC) He is vandalizing only German WP and he has been indef'ed there long ago. What should a global ban bring, please?[reply]
  3. Majo statt Senf (talk) 04:37, 5 January 2018 (UTC) as the previous speakers[reply]
  4. Global Ban is the opposite of solving the problem concerning Avoided himself. Furthermore, only 20 % of the Accounts claimed to be Avoided belong to him, the false positives increase with every new CU (which are all initially requested and executed by DerHexer though the German CU policy demands requests by other users that are executed by our local CU). He was even claimed to have threatened schools.
    Avoided was never really a crosswiki vandal! This request is likely to make him one.
    Under these circumstances threre is no reason to trust DerHexer neither Liberaler Humanist. Exspecially the second user mentioned has not the least kind of insight in that sort of problems. --Elop (talk) 09:49, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Those CU actions mentioned were executed because they were global ones and not dewiki-only actions. They were not executed on dewiki itself but on other projects. Our local CUs were never required for that. It was only documented on dewiki because that was Avoided's main project and is still the place where most (but not all) vandalism takes place. It makes absolutely no sense that users protect this evidently confirmed (crosswiki) vandal. More information can be found on the German project page. —DerHexer (Talk) 11:44, 5 January 2018 (UTC) PS: “He even claimed to have threatened schools.” Not by me.[reply]
    Ich glaube, ich hab' nicht einmal Bock, hier weiter auf Englisch zu parlieren - obwohl .en-Kollegen eh nichts mit dem Zeug anfangen können.
    Was hier abläuft, entspricht doch vielmehr dem folgenden Schema:
    LibHum: >>Avoided ist - neben dem Vandalismus, den er tatsächlich auf .de ausgeübt hat - auch noch für jeden anderen Vandalismus ähnlicher Art auf .de, .en und jedem beliebigem anderen Wiki verantwortlich (was ich einfach mal so behaupte - zumal Hexi da ja entsprechend vorgearbeitet hat)!
    Wollen wir ihn am nächsten Baum aufhängen?<<
    (.de-)Meute: >>Jaaaaaaaa!!!<<
    Rein vandalbekämpfungstechnisch bleibt dieser Ban natürlich eine Nullnummer. Zumal strafrechtlich gegen die wenigsten Dinge davon vorgegangen werden kann. Und wenn, dann auch kaum des Bans wegen. Und schon gar nicht wegen gewagter vermeintlichen Accountzuordnungen.
    Ich denke vielmehr, die Meute möchte endlich mal Meute spielen. --Elop (talk) 21:13, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Yap, yap, yap... Define Meute. Who's part of the pack? The Rat Pack, the Brat Pack? Nobody needs Avoided, really nobody. Ridiculousy... --Informationswiedergutmachung (talk) 22:25, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Wäre Avoided beim Vandalismus geblieben müssten wir dieses Verfahren nicht führen. Einige Handlungen gingen über den Rahmen des Projekts hinaus und waren als solche intolerabel. Im Vorfeld dieses Antrags wurden die per CU gewonnenen Erkenntnisse überprüft. Es gibt keinen Hinweis darauf, dass die Schlussfolgerungen der vergangenen Anfragen falsch waren. Falsch ist ebenso Avoideds These, dass ihm beliebige Accounts zugeordnet würden entspricht schlicht nicht den Tatsachen. Die Behauptung, dass Avoided nur für die in der Abfrage 22 genannten Konten verantwortlich wäre ergibt keinen Sinn - wie käme der angeblich seit Jänner 2014 inaktive Avoided auf die Idee, Anfang 2017 in die WP zurückzukehren und dort ohne stilistische Unterschiede zu den vorherigen Konglomeraten die Art von Vandalismus zu betreiben, die ihm zuvor völlig irrtümlich zugeschrieben worden sei? Die Verantwortlichen der WMF werden die CU-Ergebnisse wohl selbst überprüfen, Einwände bezüglich dieser Ergebnisse sollten im Detail dargestellt werden. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 01:23, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  5. --Varina (talk) 10:40, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  6. --Vincent Amadeus von Goethe (talk) 13:32, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  7. just like # 1 and some other ones -jkb- 00:10, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  8. --Brainswiffer (talk) 07:22, 6 January 2018 (UTC) DerHexer says it[reply]
  9. Nur ein lokales Problem, das die DE-WP betrifft. Ein "Global ban" erzeugt bei solchen Leuten nur das Gefühl der Ehre und spornt sie an, immer wieder unter wechselnden Accounts oder IPs zu erscheinen und ihre Märtyrerrolle zu kultivieren. Ignorieren ist das Mittel der Wahl. --Schlesinger (talk) 11:01, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  10. --Nuhaa (talk) 19:01, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  11. No need at all for global ban. Solve your problems locally. --Howan Hansi (talk) 08:14, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Cynical. Marcus Cyron (talk) 10:29, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Just read the statements of en.wp checkusers: en:Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Avoided --Howan Hansi (talk) 10:41, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Dös is a Bayer, die glänzen dereit mit seltsamen Sprüchen, siehe Dobrindt. Gebts dem Moa a Wurschtsemmel. --Informationswiedergutmachung (talk) 19:25, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  12. I'm never comfortable with a large group deciding to kick one person (or a small part) out. -- UKoch (talk) 22:55, 7 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  13. Oppose Oppose ★ --Dostojewskij (talk) 03:00, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  14. Oppose Oppose on principle, no-one deserves to be globally banned (except for @INeverCry:). Although I cannot say that I am a fan of Avoided’s behaviour on the English Wikipedia as I see them mass-revert leading to many good faith IP edits to be reverted which is the assumption of bad faith and is the type of behaviour that causes new people to dislike Wikipedia, I cannot endorse the global banning of anyone (other than INeverCry/Daphne Lantier). If DerHexer really wanted to ban Avoided he would've globally locked their account as global ban discussions are rudimentary since stewards can just globally ban whomever they want at any given time, and since he hasn't locked Avoided’s account I don't see why “the community” should choose to do so. A global ban is nothing but a way to strip local Wikimedia projects of their autonomy, has Avoided abused their editing privileges on German Wikisource? No. Has Avoided abused their editing privileges in the English Wiktionary? No. Has Avoided abused their editing privileges in Wikiversity? No. So why ban them from over 900 (nine-hundred) Wikimedia wiki's for malpractice on 2 (two)? I know that my “vote” will be ignored, but banning Avoided from every single project is not only excessive, it's the worst kind of bad faith, worse than whatever Avoided has done. --Donald Trung (Talk 🤳🏻) (My global lock 🔒) (My global unlock 🔓) 10:07, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    "stewards can just globally ban whomever they want at any given time" is simply false. —MarcoAurelio (talk) 10:14, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    And to add to this: global locks. Locks are mostly only given in clear-cut cases. To state that stewards do it at random and whenever they want is simply incorrect and misleading. --Wiki13 talk 10:37, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    WHERE for god sakes do you see mass-reverts of good faith IP edits? Look through the freakin edits closely!? The only reverts of god faith edits are by mistake at best. I deliberately avoid reverting god faith edits. Apparently, it doesn't matter what I do; it's all bad anyways when u have become a persona ingrata. Other than that, I appreciate your comment and agree with it. --Avoided (talk) 15:57, 8 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  15. --Verum (talk) 09:50, 9 January 2018 (UTC) It´s a problem in the german wikipedia. Mostly german accounts vote here. I change my vote if enough users from other languages support.[reply]
    Exactly the point. They just export their local problem to other projects. And the "Klohirn", of course, they will not get rid of, that's for sure, no matter where this global ban request may end up. --A.Savin (talk) 11:15, 9 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Es gibt auch in de.wiki zahlreiche Benutzer, die sich in internationalen Projekten betätigen. Verlangt ihr wirklich von Benutzern, die von Avoided z.B. mit Gewalt bedroht wurden ("ICH SCHLAG DIR DIE FRESSE EIN"), dass sie sich in internationalen Projekten beteiligen, in denen Avoided weiterhin normal editiert? So jemand gehört aus allen Projekten gesperrt und dass dies nicht von der WMF als Office-Action kommt ist eigentlich ein Skandal. Avoided hat in seiner Stellungsnahme selbst zugegeben, dass er mit dem Gewaltandroher identisch ist. --Engie (talk) 13:21, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Oppose Oppose Global ban must be and must remain exceptional, a.k.a spam bot and massive cross-wiki disruption (specially on unpopulated and weak wiki). fr.wiktionnary project sysops and community are strong enough to judge and deal with vandalism & disruption alone. We ban when it's necessary. V!v£ l@ Rosière /Murmurer…/ 18:58, 9 January 2018 (UTC) Change to neutral. V!v£ l@ Rosière /Murmurer…/ 14:59, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  16. --Muellersmattes (talk) 13:18, 10 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  17. --Trollflöjtenαω 17:02, 10 January 2018 (UTC) „Avoided has >20,000 edits on EN-WP and even an empty block log.“ (A.Savin) How should that be possible, if it were a global problem? I can barely check the exposition of The Hexer, but I can see that avoided is not locked in the enWP. Please locked him first in enWP and make then the request for global ban. Look also „gewagter (...) Accountzuordnungen.“ (Elop) Ergo: In dubio pro reo – in doubt against the ban.[reply]
    He violently threatened users on de.wiki, some examples: [19] [20] [21]. But these users also work on international projects, e.g. Holmium has more than 4500 Edits in fr.wiki and Stefan64 has substantial edits on commons and en.wiki. Therefore a global ban is more than appropriate, alone to protect the other users. This is also according to the policy: Harassing or threatening contributors to the projects, on- or off-wiki. --Engie (talk) 13:51, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    The local lock is enough for that – I cannot see in the links a reason for a global action. – The following refers only to the German chapter:
    Wenn ich mir die Vorgeschichte von Avoided ansehe, war er offenbar mal ein gutwilliger und durchaus geschätzter Wikipedianer, der sich seiner Defizite bewusst war, aber auf wirklich unterirdische Art fertig gemacht wurde, ohne dass ihm irgendeiner geholfen hätte, stattdessen wurde er mit den üblichen Kindergartenphrasen aus dem Adminhandbuch abgespeist, es werde nicht aufgewogen und nach dem Motto ‚wer zurückschlägt fliegt‘ gesperrt, weil er es anscheinend nicht vermag, Dreckigkeiten so zu verpacken, dass sie noch durchgewinkt werden. Ein tiefverletzter Mensch, der jetzt mit allem rumwirft womit er meint irgendwie treffen zu können: Fäkal- und Gossensprache sowie Nazibegriffe, die von den einschlägigen Aktivisten gerne aufgegriffen werden, im Kampf für das Gute und gegen Sündenböcke. – Und sich derart völlig hilflos fühlend, wird er ebenso überflüssig weiter mit Hohn, Sophistik und der Süffisanz der echten „Wikipedianer“ überzogen – einfach sperren reicht nicht? Müssen noch solch selbstgefällige "gute Ratschläge" kommen in die Psychiatrie zu gehen? Es ist wirklich nicht schwer zu sehen, wo echte Menschenverachtung zum Ausdruck kommt und wo lediglich verzweifelter Frevel sich Bahn bricht. Aber bei den Guten sowas wie Selbstkritik zu erwarten oder anzufragen, ob es soweit kommen musste, grenz zumindest an ein Sakrileg: „blame the victims!“, heißt es dann. Warum aber hat niemand Avoided beigestanden als er viel übler beleidigt wurde als es mit Gossensprache je möglich wäre? – Wie man's mit den Menschenrechten, mit der Menschlichkeit – von der in der deWP grad soviel geredet wird – hält, erkennt man nicht am Umgang mit (pflegeleichten) Freunden, sondern wie sich gegenüber problematischen, problembeladenen Menschen verhalten wird. Verzeiht, dass ich mit meinem Bullshitbingo die Server belastete. --Trollflöjtenαω 17:39, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Avoided hat sich im Lauf des Jahr 2013 in einige Konflikte begeben. Die Situation im Mai 2013, 5 Monate vor der endgültigen Sperre des Accounts wird in dieser SP zusammengefasst. Damals unbekannt war, dass der Avoided die hier dargestellten Umtriebe unter Sockenpuppen beging. Dass Avoided schon damals für diese Dinge verantwortlich war zeigt sich in mehreren Verweise des Autors auf sein Werk, z.b. mit dem Link auf einen IP-Edit in diesem Beitrag. Die unbeschränkte Sperre wurde verhängt, ohne, dass zu diesem Zeitpunkt der Vandalismus mit den hinlänglich bekannten Accountnamen bekannt war. Dieser konnte Avoided erst nach dessen unbeschränkter Sperre nachgewiesen werden. Es ist anzunehmen, dass dieser Vandalismus bereits vor der ersten Sperre Avoideds wegen eines KPA-Verstoß im März 2013 begann, vgl. de:Benutzerin:Itti/Kontentrollerei durch Avoided. Auch wenn über Avoideds Ausraster hinweggesehen worde wäre und er stärker akkomodiert worden wäre, so wäre für dieses Vandalismusverhalten eine unbeschränkte Sperre zwingend erforderlich gewesen. Unabhängig vom persönlichen Hintergrund des Benutzers sind solche Pöbeleien den damit beworfenen Benutzern nicht zumutbar. Es ist korrekt, dass das Administrationssystem öfters unkorrekte oder ungerechte Entscheidungen vollbrachte. Avoided ist der einzige, der als Protest gegen Adminentscheidungen eine Stalkingkampagne führte. Unabhängig von jeder Interpretation der Vorgeschichte ist die Gemeinde vor solchem Verhalten zu schützen. Bezüglich meines Ratschlags: Es kam zu Edits, deren Urheber nicht frei herumlaufen sollte. Diese Edits waren keine Einzelfälle, vielmehr wurden monatelang diverse Aussagen zu Personen außerhalb der WP getätigt. Das ist weder normal noch akzeptabel. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 21:52, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Vielen Dank für deine informativen Ergänzungen, würde die Einschätzung des Einzelfalles natürlich deutlich ändern, wenn er quasi von Vornherein (auch) destruktiv und beleidigend unterwegs gewesen wäre. Aber es geht ja nicht um eine Entsperrung von Avoided, sondern hier um einen global ban, den ich persönlich nicht überzeugend begründet sehe, aber da mag ich mich irren – und allgemein 'menschlich' sowie für die deWP um den Umgang mit ihm: Es sollte reichen seine Konten einfach kommentarlos zu sperren, wie ich auch hier schon schrieb, und nicht noch Öl ins Feuer zu gießen: Das gebietet in dem Fall in seltener Einträchtigkeit sowohl die oft überstrapazierte Menschlichkeit als auch die Vernunft, die Opportunität. --Trollflöjtenαω 13:42, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  18. -- --Joergens.mi (talk) 17:08, 11 January 2018 (UTC) Because I'm not shure wether the accusations of Libreraler Humianist "a well known personality" in the german wikipedia are correct[reply]
    If you'd like to defame my charakter, you should at least use arguments. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 20:07, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  19. --Icodense (talk) 18:53, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  20. Oppose Oppose I see no grounds for a community based global ban after reviewing the en.wiki SPI and his edits on en.wiki. He has been a positive, if inconsistent, presence there, and has done good work reverting vandalism. If the WMF believes him to be deserving of an office action ban, I trust them, but based on what I see on en.wiki as evidence, I personally cannot support a global ban at this time. TonyBallioni (talk) 02:28, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  21. Filing did not evidence pre-filing criteria, unnecessarily wordy, premature, and prejudicial. For example, "Discussions" with various functionaries is irrelevant, and an appeal to a silent authority. (A filer does not need to establish who advised the user.) As others have pointed out, the WMF makes its own decisions, The stated goal here is to get the WMF to take legal action against the user, therefore this entire process is a legal threat, itself a policy violation. (Discussions like that are must be private with the WMF, not public.) RfCs here are for proposed community-baed bans, which are not normally enforced by the WMF. A user who is in bad repute in one large community may easily attract many comments, so any close should be based on policy and arguments. My opinion is that RfC should require cosignatures, because when opened without satisfying requirements, if not quickly closed, they can create disruptive train wrecks.
    I have not yet researched the user himself, and for all I know, he has fangs dripping blood. If it were up to me, I'd have checkuser look at comments here for socking. If socking is found, I'd suggest the sock master(s) could be banned here, and globally locked ad-hoc, for cross-wiki abuse, and thus would increase eligibility for a forma global ban. However, contrary to the naive imaginations of too many, global bans do not stop highly abusive users from continuing abuse. It actually can increase abuse, as the user no longer has anything to lose. --Abd (talk) 15:20, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  22. Oppose Oppose this user seems to act only on few wiki. Blocking him on these wikis should be enough. Pamputt (talk) 21:24, 15 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  23. Very obviously a local problem and not a global one. --Scharinga (talk) 13:53, 22 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral

  1. Neutral Neutral I'd love to see more vandalism from that user before deciding. --Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 09:42, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Neutral Neutral Case similar to this one (but there the CU were positive). Global ban was applied but it's the threat to pursue legal actions that definitively solved the problem. V!v£ l@ Rosière /Murmurer…/ 14:59, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Neutral Neutral Per Liuxinyu970226, I didn't since any disruption on English Wikipedia at this moment. SA 13 Bro (talk) 18:41, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Neutral Neutral Per above. Enwiki disruption not evident. My name is not dave (talk) 13:18, 15 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Neutral Neutral Didn't look a disruption edit in Indonesian Wikipedia at this moment. Murbaut (talk) 23:48, 27 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Neutral Neutral No terribly widespread disruption, although concerns raised should be looked into. hiàn 23:51, 27 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Threats of physical violence are serious criminal offenses. AFAIK if someone uses Wikipedia as a medium for such criminal acts, the procedure is to contact emergency [at] wikimedia.org to obtain the IP address and to contact the law enforcement authorities, providing the IP address and e. g. a screenshot, and then the authorities will do their job. Is that correct? So if that's the best thing we can do, how would a global ban actually help dealing with such a situation? --Dealerofsalvation (talk) 05:23, 5 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

A global ban would help us stop this user by letting us take more drastic action against the user. This means (with good reason and evidence of course) using CheckUser being able to find his socks whenever one pops up and locking the account. If he uses a proxy we can also go and remove his ability to make threatening accounts by blocking them. If only a local block was made the user will make sockpuppets via a proxy and threaten users on other wikis. Any editing through such a ban would be a Terms of Use violation and could therefore be dealt with more swiftly and seriously than before --Sau226 (talk) 00:38, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hereby, i inform the community of en:Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Avoided. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 23:28, 6 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

To my understanding, the investigation has been partially carried out, but the results were not compared to the results of Checkuser trial 36 at Loginwiki. There was only one closer intersection between Avoided and of the accounts found by the checkuser at Loginwiki - en:User:Adolf Hynkel, which had a few edits two hours after the last and three hours before the next activity of Avoided - therefore nothing of interest was found. Should the responsible officials require further proof than the checkuser trials at Loginwiki, i recommend comparing the login data of Avoided for December 2017 to the data found at Loginwiki. --00:43, 8 January 2018 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Liberaler Humanist (talk) [reply]

User:A.Savin has above refered to Avoideds editcount in ENWP. These edits are summarised via Xtools. There are in fact 20.000 Edits, but they mainly fall into 4 short periods of time: October 2010 to January 2011 (8.800 Edits), February to March 2013 (8.700 Edits), October 2013 to January 2014 and December 2017 to January 2018 (2.600 Edits). There is no obvious explanation for the pause after January 2011. The activity period from February to March 2013 started shortly before Avoided requested an block of his Account at DEWP and stopped, as he got blocked for three months after profanities against an administrator at DEWP - notice the link to an IP edit as well as the topical similarities to Avoideds nuisances. On the 3rd of October 2013, he was blocked indefinitely after a violation against the no personal attacks rule. On the same evening, he started editing ENWP again. In the middle of January 2014 a checkuser trial was conducted and Avoided was marked with the sockpuppet abuser-template on his userpage at 20:34 on the 14th of January. After noticing, he reverted this edit on his userpage two times and left again. The return in December 2017 appears to be a reaction to preparations for this request. While the numbers A. Savin cites are correct, they do not indicate, that Avoided has a yearlong history of constructive collaboration at ENWP. As DerHexer has mentioned, his empty block log results from the circumstance, that banning him was forgotten after a checkuser in 2013. Avoideds edit history - especially the almost three years from January 2014 to December 2017 without any notable acitivty can not be called encyclopedic contribution. His recent phase of acitivities seems to be a statement regarding this request. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 17:18, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure why you pinging me -- his activity statistics from EN.wikipedia may be odd, but it's not relevant for the question, if Avoided deserves a GB. Perhaps you can state, what I already asked for: what exactly do you hope to achieve with a GB of Avoided, especially given the fact that he has been already indef'ed on Deutsche Wikipedia years ago and that the "Kolhirn" is nonetheless "alive and kicking". --A.Savin (talk) 23:02, 11 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
He randomly logs into en.wiki to do anti-vandal work with Huggle. He also seems to generally be good at it and from what I can tell, better than some of our more consistently active users (I haven't seen a bad AIV complaint from him, and I'm typically pretty strict on not being trigger happy on those.) Additionally, one of our CUs did a full check of the accounts alleged to be active on en.wiki and found no evidence for a CheckUser block. If he is being constructive on our largest project, I cannot support a global ban. TonyBallioni (talk) 02:33, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Randomly is in my opinion not the right term. He disappeared from ENWP in 2014, after a checkuser could proove, that he was also abusing sockpuppets there. His return in December 2017 was prompted by the preparations for this request. I wouldn't call this a history that supports a positive picture of this user. Regarding the SPI at ENWP: There was only one account with an intersection to any of Acoideds edits that was smaller than one day. In order to get any meaningfull picture, Avoideds edits should be compared to the accounts that have appeared at DEWP. However, it seems likely that Avoided is using means to seperate his Account from any of the appearing sockpuppets which would be possible by using a proxy or a mobile device with data volume for less than 10 €. The checkuser investigation in 2014 has prooven, that he was behind these accounts in 2014 and I don't see any reason for believing, that someone has taken over his stuff. -- 15:21, 12 January 2018 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Liberaler Humanist (talk)

@Liberaler Humanist: The Terms of Service require users to comply with the final decisions of dispute resolution bodies that are established by the community for the specific Project editions (such as arbitration committees); these decisions may include sanctions as set out by the policy of the specific Project edition, and an alleged breach of this provision is likely more than sufficient to take offwiki action. If you are, as you say, in contact with the Wikimedia Foundation, then they are more than capable of assessing the threat and taking an office action if need be. Please explain to the community why WMF Legal/Emergency have not intervened before continuing with this request. If necessary, please email Legal and ask them to make a statement here. TheDragonFire (talk) 12:20, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding the Terms of Use: There has never been a decission fo a dispute resolution body. Avoided was banned from DEWP and commons by administrators. He planned to appeal at the arbitration commitee, but never did so. Therefore, i don't think that there is a "final decisions of (a) dispute resolution body". Regarding WMF: To my understanding, Legal does not act in order to enforce decissions made by the community, which includes admin bans. Legal acts as the legal represantant of the WMF. In order to get them to do anything regarding this case, a global ban would be necessary, as the global ban is the formal exlusion of a user by the Foundation. I presume, that there has not been an intervention by Legal before, as there was no basis. The advice of the local Chapters, who are dealing with the continuous Abuse was to request a global ban. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 15:21, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Liberaler Humanist: To my understanding, Legal does not act in order to enforce decisions made by the community This ban proposal is a decision made by the community, and to my understanding is no more enforceable than a local ban on dewiki. If you want a WMF directive banning the user, you'll need to contact the WMF. As Dealerofsalvation pointed out above, serious threats to life and limb, such as has been alleged in relation to the school incident, do constitute a basis for Legal to get involved, and the correct procedure is to email the WMF emergency team. It's an interesting legal question whether community bans are covered by the Terms of Service, but this ban doesn't appear to get you any further. TheDragonFire (talk) 01:14, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Speedy close without prejudice because irreparably damaged by defective filing and thus premature comment and reaction. ("without prejudice" means that it could be filed again, if defects can be and are remedied. Not "re-opened," but perhaps if it is filed again, a note could be placed here. I would recommend that global ban proposals be immediately full-protected, and then co-signed by a steward, who would then be considered "involved," before being opened for comment. I can think of many train wreck discussions that might have been avoided with this practice. --Abd (talk) 15:29, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
As long as this remains open, count on more commentary that does not address the primary issue, but instead reacts to some obvious impressions. This is a classic case of Unresolved Dispute, as I can see in google translation of Avoided's last edit to Commons in 2013 (just before being indef blocked there fore "abusing multiple accounts). Wiki communities, unfortunately, often decide disputes rather than actually resolving them. This can create a highly offended user. Such users, it is not uncommon, may become Long Term Abusers. They will not give up, so more and more labor goes into enforcing blocks and bans, and this has often continued or has even intensified after global bans. Has anyone attempted to treat Avoided with respect? Did anyone on Commons counsel him that if he used Commons to retaliate, he could be banned, and that this could lead to a global ban, thus feeding the satisfaction of his perceived enemy or enemies? (I am making no judgement at all on the original dispute, but only that he ended up, it is obvious, feeling deeply insulted.) No, his User Talk page on Commons shows no attempt to guide or supportively counsel. Among the many flaws in this RfC is a lack of links to necessary evidences, but rather much unnecessary chatter (which is continuing). If this is closed and refiled, the filer should get some expert advice.
  • I am assuming Avoided is community-banned on de.wikipedia, but I have not specifically verified that. It takes a community discussion to ban, not merely an administrative decision. Avoided is indef blocked on Commons, and from his final edit, it's no wonder, but ... this appears to be an ad hoc decision (even though normal).
  • Avoided is not blocked on en.wikipedia, and claims of misbehavior there are, then, irrelevant (they would be relevant there). There are two major stages to a global ban, the policy reflects that. There must be a cross-wiki problem, a present danger of cross-wiki disruption, as evidenced by community-supported bans on multiple wikis (preferably, but some indef blocks might qualify. The Commons block does not, as far as anything I found), i.e., as decided by local communities, and it is recognized that individual administrative decisions can be ... biased or shallow or temporary (indef does not necessarily mean "forever," and Avoided could ask for unblock on Commons, for example, by providing assurances and honoring them, even if he had been previously disruptive -- as he was.)
  • The Commons user page links to Category:Sockpuppets of Avoided], which, then, links to the de.wiki checkuser investigation. The Commons category lists 21 sock accounts. I looked at the contributions for each. Most were blocked by the same Commons admin. A few of the accounts were globally locked; most of this appears to be connected with de.wikipedia, the accounts had very low contributions; many accounts were blocked on Commons, apparently, simply because of de.wikipedia checkuser. But see below. A steward might well respond to a complaint for an LTA editing de.wiki and commons. I did not go so far as to examine steward requests.
  • Avoided's declared agenda, if maintained deeply enough, (remember, this was 2013 -- and the activity extended into 2014, I found nothing later on Commons), would indeed lead to a global ban or, under some circumstances to an office action. However, he has not crossed the threshold for either.
  • Summary: Avoided should be formally warned that if he does not clearly renounce or abandon that motive of revenge, as to his WMF account activity, he will likely end up globally banned. I have requested speedy close because this filing was premature and heavily defective, but he should know that next time he may not be so lucky. (Or sometimes these things close in disregard of policy; the community can do that.) The things he did in the past are such as to create revulsion and blame, in the sight of many, no matter what his personal justification for it. --Abd (talk) 17:10, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Well, I'm oppose right now cause global shouldn't get used only on suspicion and some verified facts seems mixted with some suspicions/suppositions in. I'm investigate a bit further to make my mind and maybe change my votes. But for that I need some clarifications. Does this page referenced all "true" confirmed CU sockpuppets accounts from Avoided or are they mixted with some suspected accounts linked ? Some accounts name seem trivials (i.e. Biotoilette fuer den Garten), I don't speak German so I can't notice the real trashy one (the one truly offensive or namely attacking users), does some are listed there as example ? If no, does it causes they got deleted/masked/unmentionned on that list or because are they non-existent ? The modus operandi reminds me a lot one of our vandal though. And I don't want say mistakes cause I don't know the details but I believe that we get rid of him because Quentinv57 contact the Legal team in order to threat to take legal actions against that user and in our case it worked. Though the facts in our case could easely be brought to the court (public insults with some real racists shits inside, contributor's name usurpation or deformation, etc., etc.). Regards. V!v£ l@ Rosière /Murmurer…/ 16:24, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The first checkuser trial regarding this issue was de:Wikipedia:Checkuser/Anfragen/Diesel-Accounts, conducted 5 months before Avoided was banned from DEWP. de:wikipedia:Checkuser/Anfragen/Avoided, to which you have referred was conducted in January 2014. Using the findings of the SPI, Avoided was not only found to be the cause of the sockpuppetry listed in the first part of this SPI, but also of the abuse in the SPI "Diesel-Accounts". In the second SPI, some ranges were found to be not from Avoided, but for most of the following stuff, Avoided could be found as the cause due to the ranges used and the configuration of his internet access. The same is the case with de:Wikipedia:Checkuser/Anfragen/Avoided,_Teil_2. Not only has his abuse remained very similar its topics, vocabulary and manifestation, the ranges used have not changed that much over the years.
Regarding the usernames: The last ones de:Wikipedia:Checkuser/Anfragen/Avoided,_Teil_3 are one example of harassment of users through usernames and very inappropriate names in general - Google Translate may give a general impression of at least some of them. The very worst stuff was made editing pages, these were all deleted and hidden. We have reported these activities more than once to the police, but as we don't get a party status in these proceedings, we don't know what came out of this. Making threats on the internet is also a thing that is formally completely illegal, but appears to be sparely prosecuted. Appart from emergency situations, I'd not consider criminal law to be usefull against this issue. The way to go appears to be filing cease and desist letters until the culprits computer gets impounded. We have suggested this to the local chapter, but they insist on the foundations formal sanctus. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 02:45, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks a lot for your time, google translate does pretty bad work translating German to French but enough to show some real poos. I retire my oppose cause the case looks really pretty similar to the one I mentioned before and he got cross-wiki banned cause of the army of its dirty accounts even if he wasn't active (I guess) in other project than the french ones. The fact that the SUL effect was spreading these horrors in other wikis in the accounts creation logs was enough. Altough the CU in that case were strictly positive. So I retire my oppose but can't support either. Anyway I think you should contact straightly WMF for legal actions. V!v£ l@ Rosière /Murmurer…/ 14:59, 13 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
In theory a ban discussion should close on the strength of arguments, not the number of votes. (In which case arguments presented by "Neutrals" might be considered.) In practice, sometimes numbers seem to count. The community can overrule policy (which this ban would be doing if it is implemented) but a long-term consensus was expressed on policy. I have not done a vote analysis yet, but can a large number of votes coming in from one wiki -- where the user is banned -- create a global ban, preventing the user from using wikis where he is not being disruptive and appears to be accepted? There are possibly flexible solutions to the problem. --Abd (talk) 02:10, 16 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I would suggest that we leave this RfC open for at least 3 days starting from tommorow and then redirect this matter to the responsibles at the Foundation in order for them to make a decission. -- Liberaler Humanist (talk) 12:25, 18 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

As several comments suggest that there is only a local problem, or that enwiki is not affected: Probably it is true that arguing what an "ongoing pattern of cross-wiki abuse" actually is is necessary. (Perhaps such Jekyll and Hyde behaviour using different wikis is that just as well.) However, this does not mean that, if your home wiki is not affected, there is no cross-wiki abuse at all. Most globally banned users only disturbed a couple of wikis. I just think that "if I don't see it in my home it ain't anywhere" arguments are ridiculous. → «« Man77 »» [de] 11:06, 25 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Retrieved from "https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Requests_for_comment/Global_ban_for_Avoided&oldid=18211920"