Wikipedia talk:Vandalism

This is not the page for reporting vandalism. This page is for discussion of the Wikipedia:Vandalism page and the associated policy. Report obvious vandals at Administrator intervention against vandalism Report any other incidents at the incidents noticeboard. For common cases of vandalism, just revert them.

See also: Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Removing warnings

Ease of Use Vinegar

Like syntactic vinegar, vandalism should be discouraged by requiring a logged in user to edit any page. This will prevent most casual vandals. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ggb667 (talk • contribs) 15:09, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

This has been rejected many times before. The main problems are that most (~70%) of unregistered edits are constructive, so requiring registration will remove many good editors, and many vandals will just register as it only requires a username and password. Plus we couldn't prevent most editing from vandalism hotspots such as schools as we do now. There are plenty of other problems that are more pressing than vandalism, and such a drastic change really isn't warranted. Hut 8.5 15:55, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

I would like to know where this 70% figure comes from. In my experience, there's a lot of mindless vandalism from anonymous users. i can't see that it is asking too much to require editors to log in before editing. It's not exactly setting the bar very high. Michael Glass (talk) 13:55, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes me too. Problem is for schools like Primary schools the block should be lifted. Whats the probability of 7 to 11 year olds knowing about this site? Itfc+canes=me (talk) 16:37, 14 May 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Itfc+canes=me (talk • contribs)

High. Consider today's technologically minded world. Unlike high schoolers an above, whom often are limited to sources other than generalised encyclopaedias, but it's a simple, easy to use source of information for young people to use for reports and projects, that don't require bibliographic record and lack limitations on sources. Neuro√Synapse 11:50, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

I disagree that 70% of unregistred edits are benign. My impression is that 30% is a more likely ratio, at best. Nielmo (talk) 22:02, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

it's really difficult to judge percentages from one person's perspective. personally, I'm always running across IPs who are making useful, constructive edits to articles; I'd even seen IPs who revert vandalism from other IPs. the fact is, not every responsible editor wants to be part of the wikipedia community (heaven knows I have days when I don't want to be part of this community ), and I'd hate to lose valuable contributions because of some 'join or die' attitude.

now what might be useful is to start keeping track - if an IP has made 50 or so constructive edits, mark it somehow as a de facto user, and focus anti-vandalism efforts on IPs with few or no edits. that might add a little more efficiency to the process... --Ludwigs2 22:45, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Edit history vandalism

Copied from WT:VAN/Archive 6:

Is the creation of edit histories on redirect pages (via multiple edits with the effect of preventing future non-admin assisted page moves to the redirect) vandalism? — AjaxSmack 04:19, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Please provide an example. I make loads of RDRs and mistakes are not uncommon. Richard001 05:37, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

I'll try to create a hypothetical example. A page is titled Lage Raho Munna Bhai and I want to move it to the outrageous new title of Rajkumar Hirani's insult of Gandhi. I proceed to move it to Rajkumar Hirani's insult of Gandhi and Lage Raho Munna Bhai is now automatically made a redirect with one entry in the edit history. To prevent another editor from returning the page to Lage Raho Munna Bhai, I then go to Lage Raho Munna Bhai and change it from #REDIRECT [[Rajkumar Hirani's insult of Gandhi]] to #redirect [[Rajkumar Hirani's insult of Gandhi]]. This creates a two-entry edit history preventing non-admin moves and forcing editors who want to return the article to Lage Raho Munna Bhai to post it at WP:RM and get wide "consensus" to move it back to its orginal title. — AjaxSmack 19:51, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Do you have any real examples of this though? I'd just treat it on a case by case basis. The worst that can happen is having to ask an admin to move it. Richard001 21:13, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

An example is here where the edit summary reads "Null edit to pre-empt move war." This user was straightforward about it but others aren't. So, I repeat my question: Is the creation of edit histories on redirect pages (via multiple edits with the effect of preventing future non-admin assisted page moves to the redirect) vandalism? — AjaxSmack 01:06, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Don't know if it counts as vandalism, but it certainly seems dubious behaviour.--Kotniski (talk) 05:24, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, given that vandalism is defined here as "any addition, removal, or change of content made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia", I don't think the case you have cited would qualify. Talking to the Wikipedian in question would be the best idea. Richard001 (talk) 05:38, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

There is an Arbcom ruling on the subject here, which will apply to the "having to post it to WP:RM" issue. I don't feel that it's even approaching vandalism. It's closer to WP:DE going on, if the user is doing so with ill intent. As Richard states, it's probably best to just talk to the user in question. Parsecboy (talk) 13:28, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the input and for pointing me to WP:DE. I was just curious about the issue in general and, in this particular case, I assume good faith since the user announced his purpose. It will work itself out through the RM process that has already started. — AjaxSmack 00:37, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I'll give you a real example. Colin Ferguson was moved to Colin Ferguson (mass murderer) and then Colin Ferguson was edited, preventing reversing the move. When it was suggested that it be reversed at WP:RM, the inappropriateness of the move was overlooked. There have been numerous previous attempts to make the move to (mass murderer), each of which have been reverted previously. It is never appropriate to use (mass murderer) as a part of a subjects name, no matter how much you dislike them. Apteva (talk) 02:59, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Finding It

I've seen it myself. One person wrote something bad about Albert Murphy. If somebody says something bad about somebody, it's vandalism.Wollslleybuttock (talk) 03:34, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Table of types of vandalism

Given our dislike of spilling WP:BEANS, is there really any need for the policy page to include this detailed table of ways of vandalising Wikipedia? Wouldn't a general definition be enough?--Kotniski (talk) 05:24, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

If vandals can't think this stuff up for themselves, they're unlikely to spend much time reading anything, let alone Wikipedia's guidelines. Richard001 (talk) 05:38, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

So who is it for then, if it's all so obvious?--Kotniski (talk) 06:21, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

These categories can sometimes be useful - I once got a complaint from a vandal who thought that because his vandalism was hidden inside comments it was acceptable - but it could be trimmed down a bit. Hut 8.5 08:34, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Reality check

Hi, I'm wondering if anyone here could comment on this edit [1]. Someone keeps adding the word "terrorist" to the Hamas article, and others keep taking it out, characterizing it as vandalism. I think that's clearly not the case (it may be POV, or violate other policies), but I'd appreciate some neutral input: is this vandalism? IronDuke 00:23, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I think it depends on the context of the word, but I'll have to check. --Zaniac 19:22, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

New policy idea: Require IP edits to be made with edit summary

Here is a new idea for a policy: one in which those who edit using IP rather than an account, will be required to use the edit summary in order to be able to save the edit. Until something is filled into the edit summary line, clicking save will not be possible.

It is quite obvious by now that most vandalism is at the hands of IP editors, and quite a lot of it has involved blank edit summaries. Perhaps requiring this line to be filled in would reduce the amount of vandalism. Hellno2 (talk) 07:50, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it that much of a deterrence, as most of the vandals would just type in 1 char to overcome the limit. Also, it doesn't seem to be right to single out IPs for this change. NanohaA'sYuri^{Talk, My master} 19:28, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Requiring users to fill in the edit summary has been proposed many times. Among the objections is that it will lead to meaningless summaries added just to meet the requirement. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 19:55, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Adding unsourced or original content

Is adding unsourced or original content vandalism? The template {{uw-unsourced3}} suggests that repeatedly adding such content is considered vandalism, but nothing about it is mentioned on this page. 86.1.249.35 (talk) 15:14, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

"What vandalism is not" vs "What is not vandalism"

First of all, I apologize if this has been covered in another discussion.

What vandalism is not seems to me as an incorrect title for the section which it describes. The title, as it stands, would be more appropriate if the section described acts of vandalism and then sought to explain that these acts of vandalism do not constitute something else. "What is not vandalism" makes more sense to me because this title suggests that there will be a description of situations/acts that do not constitute vandalism.

I realize that this may not make a lot of sense to others as it does to me so I apologize if it souds confusing or overly trivial. SWik78 (talk • contribs) 15:49, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Be bold and change it.--Kotniski (talk) 16:36, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I also agree with the change. I think it should be done.  Orfen  ^T • _C 20:16, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. The title is What vandalism is not, and if you change it to a complete sentence for each subject, it would be Vandalism is not Tests by experimenting users for the first point, and so on. --Hamster X (talk) 14:14, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

The point being, I think, that normal English would have it the other way round - "tests... are not vandalism". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kotniski (talk • contribs)

That's exactly my point. Tests are not vandalism sounds more correct that Vandalism is not tests. To me, at least. SWik78 (talk • contribs) 17:40, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

False charge of vandalism

An edit of mine was reversed by a bot due to being "vandalism," even though it was not. This concerned the article on death. If a bot is convinced your good-faith edit is vandalism, how do you get around that? My guess is just re-adding the material will get nowhere. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.200.168.205 (talk) 09:51, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Your edit was not undone by a bot but rather Wikiscient I suggest if you have any problems in regard to the edit the person made you ask on the editors talk page. Thanks Monster Under Your Bed ^(talk) 09:55, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Dirtfoot

I need a whinge. The above article started life fairly well-formed, it has then been edited into nothing, even spent some time as a redirect. On balance of probability one could say that all edits are good faith, but if anybody and everybody can edit, which is an admirable ambition in itself, how can we ensure that the "facts, the whole facts and nothing but the facts" are there. Wouldn't it be great if each page was split into two - a protected page and an editable page - which could replace the protected page when authorised by a non-contributor to the article. This would enable the aims of WP to be kept, while at the same time offering something that could be a reliable source of information. At the moment it's nothing more than a semi-anarchist free-for-all graffiti wall. --Richhoncho (talk) 19:20, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Flagged revisions. Don't know when it's going to finally come live.--Kotniski (talk) 19:24, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Why do Wikipedia wanted to blame me?

I have never edited Paul McCartney's page, then they said that I vandalized the page.I've been blame for nothing,I look through the history and I saw the page was vandalized by my IP address, but it wasn't me who vandalized it.I am not an active user, so I need some help to report to the administrators. 124.82.61.100 (talk) 16:30, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

I've already addressed this at this IP's talk page. —C.Fred (talk) 16:53, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

a suggestion for group consideration

I'd like to suggest that the normal 'four-warning' process be skipped, and immediate intervention and blockage be available, whenever a vandal targets the user page of someone who flagged him for vandalism. this is pragmatism more than anything else - a vandal who targets vandal patrollers leaves no doubt that he is intending vandalism, and I haven't yet seen a case where such a user didn't get blocked anyway. in the long run, this would save a lot of people a lot of effort going through the motions of giving a 'fair chance' to someone who clearly isn't interested. --Ludwigs2 19:49, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Alternative suggestion-What about just shortening it to two warnings, or one even, instead of four? Marcia Wright (talk) 20:25, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

well, I think that's partly implied (since they'd have to get at least one warning in order to have a patroller to attack) but I could agree with this as well. --Ludwigs2 18:52, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Deliberately adding false information

What form of vandalism would deliberately adding false information fall under? Example: [2]. Vandalism for the purpose of appropriating Wikipedia's reputation to lend validity to a false statement. (Or maybe it was deliberate misinformation to make WP look bad?) What's the course of action to take? Just a {{vandal}} on the IP talk page? - Keith D. Tyler ¶ 21:53, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

inappropriate humor, maybe? that's probably what I'd use, anyway, since it seems he's intent on pulling someone's leg. --Ludwigs2 18:54, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Well.. It sounds to me like he added info to the encyclopedia so he could tell a friend either "it's true, wikipedia says so" or to say "look what crap Wikipedia says". Either option deliberately disrupts and harms the encyclopedia, whether or not they thought it was just good fun to misrepresent it. - Keith D. Tyler ¶ 15:46, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Template vandalism

Since Template vandalism seems to be the new fad as a quick browse of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents will show (plus personal experience with the relatively few articles on my watchlist), I think it would be a good idea to have a Wikipedia:Template vandalism article. I would urge anyone who has any knowledge about this to write an article. It seems that the main fear when this sort of thing occurs is that Wiki has been hacked, I know because that was my first thought when I experienced it. A proper informative article would perhaps allay the worst fears for most casual editors .--Saddhiyama (talk) 01:34, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

I could write one (and will tomorrow, if no one else gets to it) but I think it would only need a section in this article, not an entire article of its own. --Ludwigs2 03:48, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

I added a blurb here - wp:Vandalism#Obstinate_.28Template_and_CSS.29_vandalism - though it could probably use some editing. --Ludwigs2 17:54, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, even though the blurb may or may not need more work it is still very helpful in removing some of the confusion concerning template vandalism. --Saddhiyama (talk) 20:24, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Spelling

"Please also note that correcting other users' typos is discouraged"

Could someone explain why this is? Excessive typos, lack of spacing, improper letter casing, all make talk pages illegible and unappealing. They discourage rather than encourage proper discussion. I want to know who thinks it is discouraged, and why it should be. I think fixing obvious typos is perfectly fine. You can't alter the meaning of something meaningless.

Furthermore, how do you deal with people who keep reverting your refactoring? We can spend a lot of time making things more aesthetic and then have some guy come and roll it back in a second, it seems equivilent to vandalism to me. Tyciol (talk) 05:25, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

On occasion, someone may intentionally mispell something. More often, the person "fixing" the spelling is actually wrong, or has mistaken the intended word, which may be obscure or technical, for something else. The person fixing the spelling may inadvertently alter the meaning of the statement, and some might even take more liberty than simply fixing the spelling. While certainly, fixing a link-breaking typo is almost purely undebatable, outside of that it's just easier to make everyone accountable for their own spelling and grammar. Some people also take offense at having their comments revised, and this is a simple thing to avoid as aesthetic pleasure in a discussion is not a top priority. Although fixing God-awful formatting is not discouraged, and that can be far more annoying than spelling mistakes. Someguy1221 (talk) 06:38, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Related essay of potential interest

Wikipedia:Vandalism does not matter; responses most welcome. Solidarity, Skomorokh 13:51, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Discouraging the "rvv" edit summary abbreviation?

In the "How not to respond to vandalism" section, I'd like to propose we consider adding a suggestion that editors should be discouraged from using the abbreviation "rvv" (or "rv v") in edit summaries. Using this abbreviation makes it too trivially and flippantly easy to brand someone else's editing as vandalism — an accusation which we shouldn't be throwing around lightly, especially if an inappropriate edit might possibly not have been malicious or wanton after all.

Except perhaps in the most blatantly obvious cases (and maybe not even then?), I would suggest that less inflammatory alternatives should be preferred. I used to use "rvv" all the time in edit summaries, but I recently decided to stop doing so.

What do others think about this idea? Richwales (talk) 03:50, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Continued unconstructive edits after block

An IP (86.18.83.87) has continued to make unconstructive edits after being blocked, I'm not sure how to deal with it, though. Do I go through the warning cycle again, issue an only warning or report it straight to WP:AIV? I know there's no hard and fast rules regarding warnings, but I'd just like to know what's usually the done thing as I can't find any guidelines or discussions covering this. Dbam ^Talk/_{Contributions} 12:25, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

unfortunately, if it gets blocked and comes back to to the same thing, all you can do is go through the cycle again. make a note of it when you report him to ANI, he'll get progressively longer blocks that way. --Ludwigs2 23:02, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism

Hi. Have noticed that someone has vandalized the page about the death of Hitler http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Adolf_Hitler I don't understand how to edit the page to remove the line "To everyone's dismay, however, Hitler had 'pulled a Tina' and now resides in Argentina." could someone please remove this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.178.140.162 (talk) 15:14, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Removed. Thanks for your help. Hut 8.5 15:27, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

BLOCKED IP ADDRESS.S

i have been made aware to my address was blocked due vandalizm my ip is 195.189.14754 but it shows as 71.249.105.66 there is not enough room for the whole ordeal that i am going thru mfs —Preceding unsigned comment added by Xtina49 (talk • contribs) 06:01, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Wrong - neither of the addresses above are blocked. -Jéské ^{(v^_^v Call me Mr. Bonaparte!)} 06:46, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

How to respond to vandalism

The way the section is worded, it implies that if I come across some vandal-inserted nonsense in an article, and I don't have time to check the edit history to see how it got there, then I should leave it there, because it might have been inserted in place of something else, and simply deleting it is the act of a "novice editor". Is this what we mean to say? --Kotniski (talk) 17:03, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

I think this is easily a matter of common sense. if you run across an edit where someone added something that could no way be part of the actual article, undo it. if the edit in question could reasonably be assumed to be part of the article, then do one of the following: remove it and ask for clarification on the talk page, take the time to investigate further, tag it with an appropriate inline template, or let it go and come back later when you have the time. --Ludwigs2 21:39, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

I'll have a go at rewriting the advice then. It may be common sense, but there are some people who actually read and follow the guidance we give them, and we don't want to discourage them from removing vandalism because they think they have to go through the whole complex process every time.--Kotniski (talk) 11:24, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

I heard Geotool is nice

Geotool is pretty good for tracking down IP addresses. I use Mozilla Firefox, so I have it installed on my browser as an add-on. That's how I found out about it. I would provide the link for it, but for some odd reason it's been blacklisted as a spam link. Can anyone explain why? Crackthewhip775 (talk) 02:34, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Demote?

Looking at this page again, while I've got nothing against it, it seems to be more like a help page or how-to page than a policy page. Any scraps of policy here are probably already contained in other pages like WP:BLOCK. Otherwise it's mainly advice about dealing with vandals. Would it make sense to reclassify it by removing the policy tag? Then people would feel freer to edit it with useful tips, without the fear that they're somehow changing WP policy in the process.--Kotniski (talk) 09:59, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Warning users

Is it okay for people who are not administrators to warn people who vandalize Wikipedia?. Mythdon (talk) 03:53, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely. In fact, there are some good ways to do it. You can use the functionality built-in to Twinkle, or use the chart here: Wikipedia:Template messages/User talk namespace. -MBK₀₀₄ 03:56, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

When i do so, I prefer to only use the first two levels of warnings as levels 3 and 4 sound like admin-use. Mythdon (talk) 04:53, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Macintosh shortcuts bug

This is trivial, but "Obstinate (Template and CSS) vandalism" says "To access the page history or edit the page when the 'history' or 'edit this page' tabs are inaccessible, use the Windows keyboard shortcut shift-alt-h to access the history, or shift-alt-e to edit the page (Macintosh computers use shift-ctrl-h and shift-ctrl-e)." This hasn't been the case since the Mac version of Internet Explorer was abandoned years ago... and of course on both platforms the actual shortcuts are browser-dependent. --Robort (talk) 00:30, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually, it works fine on my normal browser (Safari), but not on Firefox - Firefox just uses ctrl-E and ctrl-H. since that combo also works on Safari, and also in SeaMonkey and Camino, I'll edit the page to say that instead. anyone have a version of Opera they can check? --Ludwigs2 00:52, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Ah, this article answers all these questions - the Vandalism article could link to it. --Robort (talk) 02:27, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

excellent find. I'll link it in now. --Ludwigs2 03:59, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

ip adress

If someone vandalises will their ip adress be banned or just the acount? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Koolaroo (talk • contribs) 14:30, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

If anonymous, just their IP unless the IP's heen hardblocked (i.e. both anonymous and registered accounts on that IP are disabled). If registered, usually both the account and the IP are blocked (though the block on the IP lasts only 24 hours, if I recall right...). Finally, we do not ban users right off the bat - we block them first and ban only as a last resort (as a ban gives carte blanche to revert the banned user's edits and block on sight). -Jéské ^{(v^_^v Kacheek!)} 16:05, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Good-faith editors deleting vandalised sections rather than checking history

Good-faith editors see a vandalised section and delete it, not realizing than the grafitti was replacing content, not just in addition to it. It's likely more widespread than I realize, because I only notice it when I see a discrepancy: Extra space between paragraphs/sections or casual mention of a concept not previously/otherwise mentioned, as if something's missing.

This is likely perennial, but I thought I'd ask if anyone had any thought about increasing awareness of checking (at least recent) history when seeing vandalism rather than only deleting it. TransUtopian (talk) 21:50, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

can you give an example? the general practice for removing vandalism is to rollback the edit, which should reinstate any section that the vandal deleted. the only way I can see this happening is if two separate vandals hit a page before the patroller - one deletes the section, and the next adds bad content. the patroller would not see the first edit that way. --Ludwigs2 04:10, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Examples:

• National Curriculum assessment: [3] and [4]
• Mad Libs: [5] and [6]
• NAFTA: [7] and [8]

Not RC patrollers generally, but getting awareness out to others who well meaningly "see vandalism in an article, the simplest thing to do is just to remove it" without checking history. I could post on individual talk pages when I see this happening, but I would like to draw more awareness to "check the edit history to see what content was removed (and repair the damage), or leave a note on the article's talk page suggesting that someone else do this", and suggest changing that to posting to WP:EAR if the article's talk isn't frequented. TransUtopian (talk) 08:50, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Ugh, yeah, that's tough. the first one is a bot error (which I should probably report), the second is a piece of vandalism that was missed completely, and the third is vandalism correction by an IP who just didn't know what he was doing. we can write something up about this, I suppose, but I doubt it will do much good - it will only get to the people who know or bother to read this guideline. what would you suggest? --Ludwigs2 16:01, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

The sentence after "the simplest thing to do..." explains what to do additionally if "it seems likely that the vandalism was put there in place of something else". Maybe the wording could be improved to make that clearer (but I agree that most people making the kind of edits referred to above are probably not much influenced by this page anyway).--Kotniski (talk) 06:18, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

what if we rephrased it like this?

If you see vandalism in an article, the simplest thing to do is just to remove it. But take care! Sometimes vandalism takes place on top of older, undetected vandalism, sometimes other editors make edits without realizing the vandalism occurred, and sometimes bots try to fix collateral damage and accidentally make things worse. Check the edit history to make sure you're reverting to a 'clean' version of the page, or if you can't tell where the best place is, take your best guess and leave a note on the article's talk page so that someone more familiar with the page can address the issue.

--Ludwigs2 22:36, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Sounds excellent.--Kotniski (talk) 09:18, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

ok, I'll edit it in. --Ludwigs2 18:15, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

• I came here for something else, but I've just spotted this section. I think this is potentially a significant problem in Wikipedia, especially for less visited articles. From time to time I check up on articles that I'm familar with, and it is not at all uncommon to find that chunks have been deleted through incorrect vandalism repair. Typically someone has replaced a paragraph or section or whatever with a juvenile obscenity, and the next person to come along has deleted the obscenity without reiinstating the original text. Often this has gone unnoticed for months, and I wonder how many instances go unnoticed forever. If I'm noticing as many instances as I do in just a few articles, then that suggests to me that the problem is widespread. Matt 05:14, 16 November 2008 (UTC). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.134.30.114 (talk)

Any suggestions as to how to improve the situation? Remembering that deleted sections are not necessarily flagged with obscenities - sometimes people just remove a section, leaving no evidence at all of its existence.--Kotniski (talk) 08:04, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Apart from generally trying to raise awareness of this issue amongst editors, as TransUtopian said, I'm afraid I don't have any bright ideas. I suppose some incredibly clever software could identify instances but I don't see that happening any time soon. (As you say, people often delete stuff without leaving any evidence -- I've often wondered why -- but I class this as just "ordinary vandalism", which everyone knows about only too well. It's this specific issue of incorrect vandalism repair that doesn't seem to get so much publicity.) Matt 00:01, 17 November 2008 (UTC). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.134.90.235 (talk)

New template available

I have just created {{subst:uw-revertvandalism}} for (kindly) alerting those good faith editors who don't check the page history first. I think there could be a better name for it, but that is what I came up with at the time. So check it out and send me your comments about it. If you would like to change anything, feel free to do so. Thanks. --Lightsup55 ( T | C ) 18:58, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Note: I tried typing up my own message manually (on User talk:99.225.114.58 and User talk:97.65.133.2), but I felt that it didn't seem to explain in good enough detail. That is what inspired me to create the template. --Lightsup55 ( T | C ) 01:41, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Vandal fighter

I want to become a vandal fighter. Who will help me become one, and teach me how to notice vandalism (the sneaky type of vandalism). Perhaps there are certain tools I could use? Please give me some more information on this. I eagerly await your answer, J.B. 10:40, 27 October 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jouke Bersma (talk • contribs)

You can get ideas on how to do that by reading the entire WP:Vandalism article. Try checking this one out. Hope it helps. --Eaglestorm (talk) 13:19, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

It does. Thank you for your time. J.B. (talk) 14:15, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

No problem. Happy vandalhunting! --Eaglestorm (talk) 15:19, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Section removed

I undid this edit because it added an undiscussed section to the list of vandalism types. It is far too vague and requires a judgment call of "bad faith" which defeats the purpose of the list. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 04:09, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Unclear Instructions

This section: Trace the IP address (cf. http://dnsstuff.com) and add {whois|Name of owner} to the user talk page of the address. If it appears to be a shared IP address, add {SharedIP|Name of owner} or {SharedIPEDU|Name of owner}. Isn't clear in the whois command as dnsstuff doesn't give you the name of the owner. Would edit it, but I don't know what to put instead. Does it mean the name of the owner of the Network, eg, BellSouth.net Inc. (eg,{whois|BellSouth.net Inc.}? Just feel that the Name of Owner command should be more clear as to what you should write. Please let me know when this is changed, so that I can handle vandalism more effectively. Zaniac 19:06, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

How to spot vandalism

• Could someone do a re-write, so that the section on "How to spot vandalism" is near the top of the page, instead of the bottom?? I would think that it should go before "How to respond..." Thanks!!--Funandtrvl (talk) 20:28, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Can't you just move it and see if anyone objects? (I can't see why they would.)--Kotniski (talk) 20:37, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

• Maybe it could be merged/combined with "How to respond to vandalism"; for example: "How to spot and respond to vandalism".--Funandtrvl (talk) 20:40, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Sounds fine.--Kotniski (talk) 08:05, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Modifying other user's comments

Currently the policy views as vandalism:

Modifying users' comments

Editing other users' comments to substantially change their meaning (e.g. turning someone's vote around), except when removing a personal attack (which is somewhat controversial in and of itself). Signifying that a comment is unsigned is an exception. Please also note that correcting other users' typos is discouraged.

I have now bumped into several users, including an admin, who claim that changing my comment is just fine if they believe that my comment somehow mispresents (other than by a personal attack) an opinion that they have. Are they correct? This is a question about the policy, not about a specific case. Guido den Broeder (talk, visit) 22:26, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I would have thought not.--Kotniski (talk) 10:34, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Context [9], [10]. The edit summaries are particularly interesting. I would suggest that this section is in an inappropriate location and would be better placed on ANI as suggested in the header. WLU (t) (c) ^{(rules - simple rules)} 11:58, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Protecting BLP articles feeler survey

FYI, based on a conversation on Jimmy Wales's talk page:

• Wikipedia:Protecting BLP articles feeler survey

Your feedback is appreciated. rootology (C)(T) 19:27, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Policy change

Anon vandals should be blocked immediately. It wastes time (our most precious resource) to post warnings etc. Where shared IPs or schools are thereby blocked this may create an incentive to clean up their act or trace the vandals. Mccready (talk) 09:53, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Definitely. Rollbackers should also be allowed to block IPs.--Kotniski (talk) 10:14, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Absolutely not. Blocking is one of the more powerful tools at an admins disposal, it is also one of the ones that can bite newbies the most---and part of the reason why pure anti-vandal fighters find it very difficult to pass RfA's. We don't want a bunch of people going around blocking people. Of course, your response is that it would only be used against vandals. Well, if we knew that, then fine. Unfortunately, just because somebody has been granted the rollback button doesn't mean they have acquired the communities trust in dispensing a block. Rollback is granted because it is easily reversable AND because other tools essentially emulate it.---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloonCSD Survey Results 13:51, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I have a lot of sympathy for this, as over half the edits on some articles are vandalism by anon IPs and reversions of such vandalism. I think immediate blocking is a bit harsh, and would suggest for all vandals:

• Block after 3rd act of vandalism in any 3-month period.
• Stiffer blocks, e.g. 1 week then 4 weeks then 3 months then 1 year then indef.
• Warnings that are plainer and more direct. The first one, "unconstructive", is uselessly limp.
• A simpler summary of important policies like WP:CIVIL, WP:VANDAL, WP:NOR, WP:V and WP:RS should be included in the "welcome" notice, which should be posted on new IP's Talk pages as well as on those of new registered users. I include WP:NOR, WP:V and WP:RS because we currently give newbies little real help - no newbie has a chance of understanding the whole of the core policies - newbies are most at risk of having articles sent to AfD, and the the NY Times and The Economist have both suggested that this is a factor in the reduction in edit activity.

Specifically re IP vandals, I suggested shared IPs get the same treatment as other IP vandals - if schools, etc. can't control their users, it should be their problem and not ours. Their admins can always register and then ask our admins to unblock - to which our admins should respond by asking how the shared IP sites intend to eliminate vandalism and pointing out that we will hold them to their promises. --Philcha (talk) 10:16, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

PS, see Wikipedia:WikiProject_Vandalism_studies#Summary_of_findings - 97% of vandalism comes from anon IPs.

The problem with this is that ISPs are very reluctant to 86 abusive users on their network unless an official rep for the wronged party files the report (which in our case is the Foundation), and whatever isn't open proxies or schools is generally home-user dynamic addresses assigned thru ISPs. Remember that we had to put pressure on the Houston Better Business Bureau to finally get Mmbabies to stop with his insanities? -Jéské Couriano ^{(v^_^v)} 10:43, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm. Is there any way we can automate discovery that a vandal IP belongs to an ISP? If so, we send them an automated message and then proceed as above if there's a recurrence. Otherwise I suggest IPs belonging to ISPs get the same treatment as the rest. This will motivate ISPs to pay a little more attention.

Can a blocked IP create an account? If not, perhaps we should make that easier, so that good faith users have an alternative. --Philcha (talk) 11:19, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Blocked IPs can create accounts, provided "Disable account creation" is not checked in the block options. Otherwise, they have to request an account via email. -Jéské Couriano ^{(v^_^v)} 11:29, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't know why we want to waste any more time than we have to on these people. "Harsh" isn't remotely the applicable adjective. If someone comes here to damage our project, just show them the door without fuss - that's less punishment than they deserve. The first block can be for 24 hours or something, making it highly unlikely that any desirable editor will be affected by it. If the vandal is capable of coming round to do good for the project, then the realisation that deliberately destructive behaviour will not be tolerated, and trolls will not be fed, should be a step in the right direction. We have enough work to do without letting these people waste our time any more than they already do.--Kotniski (talk) 15:35, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

(undent)The policy says the tags may be placed. Somehow that has morphed into practice that they must be placed. I'll ref this talk on the reporting page.Mccready (talk) 16:21, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

If "tags" means those wishy-washy templates, I don't use them. Instead, "(this diff) was vandalism. Stop it or you will be blocked." Since I've seen blocks pretty quickly after leaving such messages, I don't think using homespun messages vs the templates is an issue. I think the problem is that the templates do not give the impression that they mean business. --Philcha (talk)

I disagree, I'm always amazed at how many vandal only accounts stop after getting a final warning. People do get the message. There is a reason behind the templates, it is to let others know that they can be monitored and a lot of people do stop when they realize that.---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloonCSD Survey Results 13:54, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I would just advise everyone to bear in mind that one of the key elements of Wikipedia is that anyone can make any edit to Wikipedia. We issue blocks to prevent someone from going on some type of rampage. The four warnings concept (see my comments on the AIV talk page) are by no means hard and fast, but keeping them in place as general guidelines does help us all keep in mind that this is a 'pedia built for the masses. Hiberniantears (talk) 16:57, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

It just depends. Some templates are useful for good-faith, but unsuitable edits. For pure vandalism though I've always used the most harsh ones. I mean, vandalism isn't wanted in any form. Why we have such templates as "Hey, thanks for posting that link to a virus on Example. Although we welcome your contribution, we don't really like that kind of thing around here so we're asking you nicely not to do it again. We mean it. Really mean it. I think..." I would definitely support tougher measures against vandals. They don't have to be draconian; just turn up the heat a bit. --.:Alex:. 18:03, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm sure the masses don't want their 'pedia damaged by vandals any more than we regular editors do. By removing vandals straight away (well, blocking the IP address they used for some amount of time) without engaging in any kind of dialogue with them, we save our time - enabling us to fight vandalism more effectively - and deprive the trolls (which many of them are) of nourishment. Four warnings is way, way over the top except in cases where there is an indication that someone is just "testing" rather than deliberately harming.--Kotniski (talk) 11:00, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

We appear to be in agreement. Since admins do the blocking, I'll contact a few and ask them to contribute here and, if they agree with a tougher approach, how to progess this. --Philcha (talk) 11:33, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't see any sort of consensus on a new policy developing here... especially one that would fly at the Village Pump. Before any policy is enacted, it has to get broader approval than one branch of the project. EG even if 100% of the people who monitor this page agree to a new policy, that does not mean that the larger community accepts it or that it becomes policy. Policy changes have to go through the Village Pump (policy) to show a broader acceptance by the community. And like I said, I see no defined consensus from this page to take to the VP.---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloonCSD Survey Results 13:59, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I've asked a few, and invited them to pass the invitation to other admins. --Philcha (talk) 11:55, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

As an adjunct, I am more liberal with semiprotection. I have been criticised for blocking long and early with anons before. Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:49, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Wow, that was quick! Thanks! --Philcha (talk)

Disagree with blocking IPs immediately. Not all vandalism is equal given the number of different messages that we could place. For example, while both damaging "THIS IS TEH BEST SHOW EVAR!" into an article is less of a worry that replaces numerous words throughout an article with insults and vulgarity. The former one, I'd give a chance to see if they improve, the second case, one more strike of that nature and blocking is appropriate. It is also too easy to mistake vandalism for an attempt to make a positive contribution but just not doing it right (such as accidental blanking). Only in the case of outright vandalism (eg the Hagger-type stuff) should zero tolerance be used, every other time one should at least warn and give 3 strikes towards. --MASEM 13:46, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Agreed... very few cases deserve immediate blocking without any warning. I have no problem with going to an level 3 or higher warning immediately for somebody with a history. But *I* will not block somebody who hasn't been warned. To do so goes against one of our core principles---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloonCSD Survey Results 14:04, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

We assume good faith up to a point. But the good of the encyclopedia is paramount. If you give someone three warnings and they stop, well, they've successfully trolled you for those three warnings. The time you've spent giving those warnings could have been spent making one block and doing two other useful things.--Kotniski (talk) 14:38, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

And that is why admins take into account the users history when making blocks, and there is no policy saying that you have to go through steps 1-3. If the account is obviously engaged in vandalism, there is nothing (as far as I am concerned at least) that says that you can't issues a level 3 or 4 warning straight away. But without a recent warning, especially for an which might be dynamic IP, we don't know if the user on the other end has received the warning.---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloonCSD Survey Results 14:59, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Well I'm saying it doesn't matter if he's received a warning; we're better off just blocking immediately (as I believe we often do already). (I only mean in the obvious cases, like vulgarities or repeated damage; the isolated "BEST SHOW EVAR" type examples don't bother me so much, though in that case I would just revert them and forget about warnings.) We have to look at the costs and benefits of these warnings, and I really don't see any benefit in 99.99% of cases unless the user visibly thinks he's doing good to the project. The costs must be pretty small per warning, but you've also got the costs of the continued vandalism, and multiply all that by however many thousands or millions of warnings are placed each year and you've got something quite sizeable. I don't say we should never warn, but the emphasis in the policy should be changed to stress what is already the case anyway - vandals are often blocked without being pre-warned.--Kotniski (talk) 16:02, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I have blocked rapid vandals without warning, and I'm sure other admins have as well. Which again is an argument against such a change.---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloonCSD Survey Results 19:02, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't get that argument... Can you spell it out?--Kotniski (talk) 19:17, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I didn't propose immediate blocking, I proposed: don't reset the warning counter so easily; fewer, tougher warnings; earlier, longer blocking - and simpler summaries of core policies, for the benefit of new editors. --Philcha (talk) 14:23, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Before you take this to the wider community, eg Village Pump, you need to write out what your proposed change is. Not just the concept, but the actual wording. Get consensus here, then approach the pump. Eg write out a proposed change, not in just abstract terms.---Balloonman ^PoppaBalloonCSD Survey Results 14:25, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

While I disagree with this proposed change, there are somethings we should definitely change:

• We should abolish the level four warnings. It is rare that I have ever seen an vandal who has gotten a level 4 warning stop vandalizing. Usually, they stop by level 3, or not at all.
• Strengthen the message of the level 3 warning templates to be more firm.
• 4chan and other meme vandals should be blocked on sight. On January 14, we did so. It was a temporary measure, but I see no reason to switch back to warning those types of vandals. NuclearWarfare _(Talk) 19:15, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Do you really think vandals stop because of the warnings? Think about it... you're being told that if you don't stop doing something, you'll be "punished" by not being allowed to do it any more. Not exactly a great deterrerent. I think we just do these warnings because we've got used to doing them, and don't have the courage to admit that something we've been doing for so long is in most cases pointless. Imagine if we routinely just blocked vandals, and someone came along with a proposal that instead, we give them as many as four (or even three, or two) levels of warning before blocking them. The idea would be summarily rejected as instruction/process creep, damaging to the encyclopedia and all manner of things.--Kotniski (talk) 19:31, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Random section break

Brought here by this note I disagree with making a change, I feel it would amount to a new rule, since tags are recommended, not required. In my vandal fighting it varies a lot the number of tags I place based on what they're doing. I block on sight rarely but when it's obvious that the vandal knows better--e.g. WOW type stuff, or the same unusual edits after another block. Sometimes I'll block after 2 warnings, sometimes more; it really depends on a lot of factors. I think admins are given leeway here, I don't think anyone's ever mentioned having a problem with a block of mine (other than blockees!). So to make a new rule introduces restriction, doesn't eliminate it. Also, I think it's really important to AGF even with stuff where that might seem farfetched, like obscenities--some of these kids really are just testing. And even if they are trying to be a pain, taking a hostile or harsh attitude is the wrong approach IMHO--it sets up an adversarial atmosphere and may make it a game for them. If you come across as authoritarian, now they're stickin' it to the Man. The sentiment I try to send is "we're just a bunch of nice folks and we'd really hate to block you, we hope we won't have to." Hence the overly polite and circumspect templates that sometimes frustrate folks who see them as not being tough enough. On the other hand, I'm not against more wording that emphasizes that these tags are optional and judgment should be used in each case. delldot ∇. 21:22, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't think straight-off blocking has much effect on them psychologically - it just makes them give up and go and annoy someone else. Being "blocked" doesn't have the same meaning to a casual vandal as it does to a regular Wikipedia editor, remember. It's the warnings (assuming they ever read them, which in most cases I suspect they don't) which are likely to turn it into a game for them - just think, I wrote "shit" in Wikipedia and I got this pretty message back! Cool! Let's see what happens if I write "dick"? And so on.--Kotniski (talk) 22:20, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

delldot and other admins make a valid point about not tying admins down to a specif warning / block cycle, because some vandals need to be stopped really quickly. So any formal proposal that come out of this should be phrased as toughening the most lenient level of treatment (which most vandals seem to get).

However I strongly disagree with "If you come across as authoritarian, now they're stickin' it to the Man", because people who think in terms of "stickin' it to the Man" will pick on whatever they see as a soft target, as Kotniski suggests. I don't think Wikipedia has any reason to make itself a soft target. --Philcha (talk) 22:47, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

So it looks like we have a disagreement about vandal psychology, hence our disagreement about how to handle them. All I can say is my understanding of vandal psychology is informed by many thousands of vandal reverts. It's fine that we disagree. I would point out, though, that there's a big burden of proof on you if you're going to institute mandatory policy that everyone has to follow. delldot ∇. 22:05, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Alternative to policy change

IP editors are already throttled. Implement stronger throttling with some type of automatic setting, say, "maximum of 1 edit per minute and 3 edits in 10 minutes." This would encourage registration and limit the damage drive-by vandals can do. This can be turned off for widely-used proxies. If you want, make this per-IP and turn it on for 24 hours at the first warning. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 02:13, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

NEVER!--Starwars1791 (talk) 05:34, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

User:Tmtoulouse created something similar on rationalwiki

Straw Poll

I was thinking we should have a straw poll to see if you endorse or oppose the policy change. Write in Bold Endorse or Oppose and sign your name. Comments are recommended explaining your vote. DFS454 (talk) 10:39, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

(The essence of the change in question is "Anon vandals should be blocked immediately" - for reasoning see above.)--Kotniski (talk) 10:55, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

• Endorse the change for at least a trial basis. DFS454 (talk) 10:39, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
• Support in principle. But I wouldn't word it like that. There may still be cases where at least one warning is appropriate; and I don't see any need to treat anons much differently from account-holders. I would just change the emphasis of the present policy; rather than implying that warning is the norm, it should imply that immediate blocking is the norm UNLESS the vandalism is very mild, in which case a warning may be given first.--Kotniski (talk) 10:55, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose for reasons explained above. I think this straw poll is premature given the lack of consensus above. delldot ∇. 21:47, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Draft tougher policy

I was asked (above) to provide a more specific draft of a tougher treatment of vandals. Please support, oppose & comment. I hope to take this to the Village Pump (policy) next. --Philcha (talk) 21:51, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

1. Vandals should be blocked after at most the third act of vandalism in any 3-month period. Admins may block earlier than this if they consider it necessary, for example in cases of persistent or sneaky vandalism, or where the vandalism exposes Wikipedia to legal action, for example by violating WP:BLP.
2. The minimum durations of blocks should be increased to a minimum of 1 week for the first offense, 1 month for the second, 3 months for the third, 1 year for the fourth and indefinite for the fifth. Admins may block for longer periods if they consider it necessary.
3. Without exception IP vandals, i.e. unregistered users, should be treated the same as registered users who vandalize. In other words there should not be more lenient treatment for shared IP addresses. If schools, ISPs, etc. do not control their users, it should be their problem and not ours. Users of shared IP addresses that are blocked should be invited to register.

• Support, but I would like to see "persistent" defined. It should be made clear that vandals who appear to be currently active are among those to be blocked without warning.--Kotniski (talk) 15:29, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose, as above. A big problem with mandatory minimums like these is that it doesn't let admins exercise enough judgment in individual cases. You're putting yourself in the position of having to predict the best outcome for every single case. Given that we don't block this way now, apparently our judgment is that it's not always the best course. Look at the American legal system for more problems with mandatory minimums. Another big problem with across-the-board rules like this is that it's not always possible to tell who's one vandal and what's a shared IP with a series of users (e.g. aol users, schools, Quatar). Sometimes we get a mix of valid edits and vandalism from heavily used IPs. As I understand it, the general consensus at places like WT:AIV is that it's often worthwhile to not block IPs that are making good edits, even if there's a high proportion of vandalism, because it's so much easier to rvv than it is to make those good edits. Once again though, it's a judgement call and it will vary on a case by case basis. So tying our hands is going to be a setback for us, and it's creepy. On the other hand, I'm certainly not opposed to wording that makes it clear that blocking without warning is ok in cases of clear vandalism by people who know better. That's a useful weapon in the arsenal. delldot ∇. 21:59, 19 January 2009 (UTC) Left a note at AIV to bring further discussion here delldot ∇. 22:08, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Unlike with mandatory minumum criminal sentencing, we don't have to feed the b*****s while they're in the sin bin.

Obviously I know only the sample of cases where I've reverted and left warnings, but some of these nuisances have several consecutive months' worth of warnings, and are still vandalising. Would you like to propose alternative means of reducing the actual amount of vandalism that occurs? --Philcha (talk) 22:16, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Is your concern only about shared IPs?

BTW I took the liberty of laying out the votes consistently so everyone can see what the balance is. I hope you don't mind. --Philcha (talk) 22:16, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

• Also, I've always felt the level one warning for vandalism should be deleted outright: level one is essentially the 'assume good faith' warning, but vandalism is pretty much purposeful. When someone detes the text of an article and replaces it with the word 'fuck' 500 times, it's really hard to see that as an accident... HalfShadow 22:30, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
• I oppose this change strongly for several reasons, it completely removes discretion from the admin making the block, every case should be judged on it's merits instead. It is far too strict and will lose us some good edits along with the bad edits it will stop, personally I think that it is a completely unacceptable trade off from wikipedia the encyclopedia anyone can edit. If this goes through many of the most popular/sensitive ip addresses will end up indefinitely blocked losing us so many oppurtunities of getting new people attracted to wikipedia after starting out from making a simple correction as an ip. I have seen cases (not very many but those few more than make it worthwhile for me) where a good edit has followed vandalism which would have required being blocked under this policy change (indeed in one case last year I blindly reverted a good edit after vandalism before another admin pointed out my mistake, the ip then apologised on it's talk page - very rare but it still happened). In most cases after a short block ip addresses do not return to vandalise - I checked my last five blocks all for 24-55 hours and none have returned to vandalise since the blocks ended - most often there is no need for increased block lengths, as Jimbo has said we should only do the minimum required to protect the project while retaining our freedom for editing. As to how to reduce vandalism - WP:Flagged Revisions - make it so vandalism is not shown to readers which is the best form of deny recognition there can be. Davewild (talk) 23:08, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Can you guys take this to the pump or create a separate proposal page, please? Most of us admins keep WP:V on our watchlists, and I for one really don't need this silly thread causing it to get bumped to the top every couple of minutes. This isn't the place. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 01:20, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Huh? This is the vandalism policy page, and this is a proposal (which not everyone considers "silly") directly concerning that policy. This seems to be the ideal place for it, and exactly the sort of thing you would expect to see if you keep this page on your watchlist. (If you want something really annoying, try keeping WP:MOSNUM on your watchlist ;) )--Kotniski (talk) 08:45, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

It is exactly the kind of thing I expect to see here, because if I had a dollar for every half-assed proposal by non-admins who want to make WP:V stricter, I'd be a rich man. It's always met with overwhelming opposition, and it's annoying to have to sit through another one. Nothing is going to get done on this talk page; you need to create a proposal page, where a better proposal can be drawn up and edited by other users, and discussion can take place on that talk page. Then you can link to that page from here. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 20:47, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Do you think this is something between admins and non-admins? Is empathy for vandals one of the requirements that admins have to satisfy? I agree this proposal is probably not going to get anywhere though. (Incidentally, WP:V is Verifiability, not Vandalism.)--Kotniski (talk) 08:16, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it's always non-admins that come up with this stuff because they don't understand how things work. And, yes, a certain level of tolerance for vandals is required for adminship. Proposals like this are always drawn up by frustrated users who don't understand that it's not the policy that dictates the actions of admins, it's the actions of admins that create the policy. You can't legislate change; you can't force us to do anything. I'm probably the least vandal-tolerant admin you'll ever meet, but even I know proposals like this are doomed from the outset. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 16:19, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Way too strong of a change. First while we have defined what is and isn't vandalism, there's enough of a grey area that there are some editors that can be considered vandalism but really are misguided efforts to add properly to WP - Vandalism is an issue with a pattern of editors and not one single one, and even then, it is quite possible to make mistakes three times in a row that may look like vandal edits. This all should be a judgment call on the blocking admin. Additionally, this is way too strong against IP editors even if most vandalism comes from them. I strongly disagree on the last point about schools and ISPs controlling their users: maybe if we're talking about a parent controlling their kid's internet, that's one thing, but there's no way to logically expect large ISPs to track the behavior of a single user that can vandalize WP in seconds, nor should we be involved in policing bad users for ISPs (save in extreme cases of perceived physical threat or harm ala suicide attempts).

The current system works, for all practical purposes. Bots catch many of the more obvious vandalism attempts and there's a lot of editors on vandalism patrol using the rollback feature or Twinkle to correct. There probably could be more help from automated tools, but there's really nothing in policy that can be changed that would help reduce vandalism more while not hurting good faith attempts at adding to WP, save for lower the lenience on the more "obvious" vandalism which I believe should drop to 1 strike and you're blocked for a day. --MASEM 14:03, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose as being unnecessarily WP:BITEy. Likewise the "mandatory minimums" section that would require a shared IP be blocked indefinitely after its fifth vandalism edit flies in the face of WP:AGF. --Kralizec! (talk) 14:14, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Re "this is way too strong against IP editors even if most vandalism comes from them": (a) that sentence seems rather self-contradictory; (b) it's less restrictive than semi-protecting pages that are targets for IP vandalism, because it allows the useful IP editors to carry on their good work.

I am disappointed that there have been no constructive alternatives proposed for reducing the amount of damage vandals do and the effort diverted into defending WP against vandals. If I made an uncivil remark about an admin out of frustration about vandalismm there'd be hell to pay (of course the same doen't apply to admins, see " I had a dollar for every half-assed proposal by non-admins" above). But we let the same vandals come back and cause trouble again and again.

I'm beginning to think we need some new admins - I suggest we should all pay more attention to RfAs and start asking serious questions about how candidates would respond to vandalism. --Philcha (talk) 10:23, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I completely agree with those sentiments (though not if "we need some new admins" means we should get rid of the old ones). But I think the best way forward is to emphasize and promote use of the tougher approaches we already have available for reacting to vandalism, rather than laying down specific rules about what must be done in every instance.--Kotniski (talk) 10:31, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Philcha wrote above, "I am disappointed that there have been no constructive alternatives proposed for reducing the amount of damage vandals ... I'm beginning to think we need some new admins - I suggest we should all pay more attention to RfAs and start asking serious questions about how candidates would respond to vandalism." Since none of the current admins have agreed with your 'zero-tolerance' stance, it would appear that you are now advocating that we be replaced with with new admins who do agree with you. While I have only been an administrator for 14 months, I am ... surprised that I would be replaced for being "soft" on vandalism. Especially since I spend time at AIV virtually every day and have performed 1983 blocks to date (for an average of 4.8 blocks per day, every day, for the past 408 days). --Kralizec! (talk) 16:59, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

• This is a silly idea, implying that patrollers and admins lack the power to judge by themselves whether or not an account needs to be blocked, and for how long. If you disagree with a decision, discuss it with an admin and try to convince them. Adding more bureaucracy on top of this process is counterproductive. A note about the lv1 vandalism warnings since that concern was raised here, if you think it is not warranted, don't use it. I only use it when I think the edit can be made in good faith. There's no rule forbidding someone to start with a lv2, 3 or 4. That would be against the intent behind the work done at WP:UW at that time. -- lucasbfr ^talk 16:00, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
• This proposed policy introduces too many pointless rules and is impossible to actually comply with. Get rid of it -- Gurch (talk) 18:20, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose as a mandatory policy, but if admins want to sign on to it themselves that's fine. Yes, there are some short blocks of chronic vandals that leave me scratching my head, but not everyone agrees with long blocks either. There is, however, enough of a consensus on how to deal with vandals among all the admins who regularly do it that I do not think some sort of sentencing guidelines are necessary. It would be subject to WP:IAR in any event, and thus relatively toothless. Daniel Case (talk) 15:43, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose as a mandatory policy. Admins need leeway to exercise judgment, as is done now. An Admin can block on the third warning (i.e. one saying they will be blocked) if s/he feels it is warranted. There seems to be already some kind of consensus on what the minimums should be (24hr and 31hr being the most used). Also, school IPs seem to be treated with less leniency that other IPs, a custom that I personally agree with. In short, we don't need mandatory guidelines that limit Admin ability to deal with vandals. -- Alexf^(talk) 19:49, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose Lets keep the status que--Starwars1791 (talk) 05:40, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Example of why this is important

I would commend the editing/warning/blocking history of this IP address (which must be very typical) to all those who consistently obstruct attempts to institute more effective action against vandals. Surely you can see that the current approach is not just wrong in some kind of abstract philosophical way, but is doing concrete harm to Wikipedia, day in and day out, for no perceptible gain.--Kotniski (talk) 14:07, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Reviewing this IP's dozen most recent edits, I see a mix of test edits as well as the sort of vandalism one would expect from a school that teaches children aged 4 - 16 years. Regardless, all of the unhelpful edits were reverted within an average of 7.8 minutes. However the real problem is the fact that while all of this IP's edits to eight different articles were reverted, only two warnings were ever issued, and one of those was from a bot. As per current Wikipedia practice, vandals are generally blocked after ignoring three or four levels of escalating warnings. However in this instance, Wikipedia editors dropped the ball and failed to issue these warnings in six out of eight cases. Those are the people who are truly obstructing our ability to deal with vandalism. --Kralizec! (talk) 00:32, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Strange logic. People don't issue warnings largely because they're a seen to be a waste of time - we've got better things to do than feed trolls in order to conform to some bureaucratic process. If people saw a system that actually stopped vandals effectively without wasting everyone' valuable time, they might be more inclined to play along with it. --Kotniski (talk) 07:12, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Changes

I've made a few bold changes to this page and the AIV instruction pages, to emphasize that warnings are not necessary in every case. I don't think this changes the status quo - everyone seems to agree that blocks without warnings are not uncommon.--Kotniski (talk) 14:40, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

And I've un-made them. We get enough inappropriate reports as it is. If there is consensus that the system is broken, we can work on changing it. But there is no such consensus, and you won't force the change unilaterally. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 16:25, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

As I say, I'm pretty sure I'm not changing the system by doing this, just documenting current practice. In one of your edit summaries you say, quite rightly, "administrators know when to make exceptions". But these pages are not for administators, but for ordinary users. It needs to be made clear to them that there is no need to go through a long process of warning when an active vandal is on the prowl. At the moment I'm sure many people are deterred by the way the instructions are phrased. Do you not agree?--Kotniski (talk) 16:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

No, it needs to be clear to them that there is a need to go through a long process, because most users are not familiar enough to decide when exceptions should be made. Abuse of the blatant vandalism template has long been a problem, which any long-time AIV participant can tell you. New users jump at the chance to report a vandal, and they are very often wrong. They waste our time by reporting content disputes, test edits, and honest mistakes. If they go through the proper series of warnings, there's a very good chance the vandalism will stop or the "vandal" will realize his mistakes and work more productively in the future. Or, as is often the case, an admin will take notice of the warnings and point out that the edits are not vandalism. Frankly, I don't care if people are deterred. There are always others to take their place. People who think following the guidelines is too much trouble are always free to work on something else. They often do, and they are rarely missed. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 18:09, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, if vandalism were only a minor matter, that attitude would be forgiveable, but it does do huge harm to the project, in terms of actual lowering of quality, wasting of time and harming of reputation. Anything that gets more people fighting it, and in a more effective way, is going to translate into direct benefits for the encyclopedia, which is of far more value than the following of guidelines for tradition's sake. If we want to stop people reporting non-vandalism as vandalism, we should work on phrasing the instructions to emphasize what vandalism is and is not, and not try to fob them off by causing them to take another form of inappropriate action instead. --Kotniski (talk) 18:50, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I support Kafziel in making the revert; these are pretty large changes and would need to gain consensus (although it's fine to make bold edits and then discuss if they're reverted). delldot ∇. 18:43, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

If you consider them large changes, that means you think they don't reflect current practice? In what way is that so?--Kotniski (talk) 18:50, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

You seem to be of the popular misconception that vandalism is a serious threat to the project, and that we're somehow losing the war. You couldn't be more wrong. Wikipedia is the most successful reference site in the world, and anyone who really understands the way it works knows we have nothing to worry about when it comes to vandalism. Things are quite well in hand, thank you very much. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 19:03, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

That sounds very complacent, considering the amount of vandalism we see every day. Agreed, the vandalism we see gets undone, and quite a lot gets picked up by bots, but by definition, the vandalism we don't know about gets through. And that's not just obvious stuff like obscenities (which will be picked up and removed eventually, though not necessarily with restoration of information that the vandal deleted), but pernicious random alteration of facts which damages the encyclopedia. I'm not saying it's a war than can be definitively won or lost, but the more efficiently we counteract vandalism, the better it will be for the project (not just because we can revert more vandalism, but because we can use the time we save to make other positive contributions). We should therefore take an open-minded attitude to attempts to improve our strategy, not just automatically attribute them to ignorance.--Kotniski (talk) 07:13, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Of course there's vandalism we don't catch right away, but that's not going to be fixed by blocking other vandals more efficiently. If we block them, that means we did catch it. The only way to avoid completely unnoticed vandalism is through passive means like page protection, which has nothing to do with this discussion. I'm not going to get into that here.

Now, does the possibility exist that an admin will block a vandal without warning? Yes. I've done it many times. Do we need to mention that possibility in the policy or the noticeboard? No. Because, quite frankly, it's none of your concern. And I don't mean that in some elitist way; it's none of anyone's business, admin or not, if I choose to wait for a full set of warnings. Nobody can make me block someone I don't feel like blocking, and I don't need people showing up and hounding me about it (which has happened in the past). So don't worry about it. Do what you're supposed to do, and if we see an exceptional case then we'll step in. If the vandalism is coming fast, then it shouldn't take very long to get to level 4. If you want to ask an admin to have a look at the situation, feel free to leave a note on a talk page. I, for one, don't mind as long as you're polite about it.

The thing is, whenever we mention the possibility of an exception to any policy, everyone thinks their case is the exception. I have no doubt that it's that very thing that started this discussion in the first place. It usually is. There was some big vandalism emergency that simply couldn't wait, but wasn't responded to within 30 seconds, so now we're all supposed to put on our fireman helmets and run around in circles making siren noises. But the fact is, it's all at the discretion of the responding admin, and there's no way to say "case X needs warnings and case Y doesn't." The same goes for rollback. If I choose to use rollback to revert a vandal, that's fine. If I choose not to use rollback - if, for instance, I want to take a more careful look at each edit and see what needs to be done - that's my prerogative. So don't worry about it. Users should be keeping an eye on articles, not other users. Once you file a report, if the article stops being vandalized, that's all you need to know. If you're hell-bent on having someone blocked and rolled back, you're taking it too personally.

That might sound complacent to you, but it's not. I'm known to be an unforgiving bastard, particularly when it comes to vandalism, spam, and edit warring. I don't generally worry too much warning templates and stuff. I'm exactly the kind of quick-to-block admin you guys think you want more of, and even I'm telling you this change isn't warranted. It's not like I'm just saying this because I secretly want Wikipedia to fail. All it would do is waste our time and make it that much harder to clear the backlogs of real vandalism. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 01:49, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

I know you mean well, but this does come across as elitist - it seems to go against the community spirit to deliberately keep information out of the policy pages because the masses can't be trusted to interpret it correctly. If it's sometimes right for the project for admins to block vandals without warnings, then it's sometimes right for the project for non-admins to report them without warnings - and we should be aiming to word the policy and instructions in such a way that makes it explicitly clear (subject to a certain degree of individual judgement) when to report and when not to.--Kotniski (talk) 07:05, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

It is explicitly clear: Vandals should be reported when they are active, and after the proper number of warnings have been issued. That's it. If and when there is an exception to be made (and that may never happen, as far as you know) the individual admin will make it on a whim. Some admins never block anybody, ever, for any reason. I might decide not to block a user simply because I just ate a nice breakfast, and french toast makes me happy. We don't need to add that to the policy. What I'm saying is, the factors that influence block decisions are too variable for anyone to be able to anticipate properly. So we don't put them in writing. Instead, we try to choose admins whose judgment we trust. And, again, you needn't concern yourself with what happens to specific vandals, because anti-vandalism work should not become a personal matter. Thousands of Wikipedia members are able to handle these requirements; if a few people can't, that doesn't constitute a problem for the rest of the project. It just means those people are ill-suited to that line of work, and should focus their talents elsewhere. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 07:42, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) I think we're still not on the same wavelength. Obviously it's for the admin to decide what to do, and I'm not supporting any of the proposals to lay down specific "musts" for admins. But those who may or may not report or warn vandals also have to make a judgement - and it's to those people that the policy and instructions are addrssed. We should word these pages in such a way that ordinary well-meaning users know what to do in specific situations, and so that what they do as a result doesn't waste their time, doesn't waste admins' time, and achieves the best results for the project. So for them, not for admins, I'm proposing that we make more of an effort to describe expicitly the courses of action available and the factors to be considered when choosing one.--Kotniski (talk) 08:51, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree that vandalism isn't doing that much damage to the project, but it does do some and surely we should come up with the most effective way of dealing with the problem whatever the magnitude. My take is just that the "tough on crime" approach usually does more harm than good (for reasons explained above by Kafziel and myself). To answer Kotniski's question, I was especially surprised to see the "warning is not an absolute prerequisite for blocking" sentence gone--I can recall times when that very sentence has made it easier to block VOAs and others with obvious intent to disrupt. It's my opinion that we should make things as explicit as possible (as far as consensus will allow us) in policies, and these changes seemed to make the policy more vague (e.g. "warn or report"--could be confusing to a new user). delldot ∇. 21:10, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I find the current wording quite unexplicit. It needs to be explicitly and clearly stated that admins will block vandals without warning in serious cases (and that such cases are not some rare event). We don't want people reporting every little test edit to AIV, but on the other hand we want people to report currently active serious vandals immediately, without wasting time with warnings. In fact, one of the main reasons I can see to report vandals is not just to block them, but to have someone with the appropriate tools roll back multiple edits. That possibility should also be mentioned in the policy.--Kotniski (talk) 07:19, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Generally speaking, I have to agree with delldot that vandalism is not as big of a problem as it has been in our past. With the profusion of anti-vandal tools like Huggle and Twinkle, not to mention the advent of our various anti-vandalism bots, most instances of vandalism are caught and reverted in short order. Having an "under siege" mentality may be the norm at wikis like Conservapedia, but I just do not see that fitting with the open culture and democratic philosophy here at the English Wikipedia. --Kralizec! (talk) 17:08, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Is edit history "vandalism"?

What if an editor has made no individual edits that disrupt or compromise the integrity of Wikipedia, but a look at the edit history causes "problems" for loyalists to the project? Is that vandalism? For example, one such editor was blocked and labeled a vandal, though his 20 edits were exemplary. -- 3 Good 1 Comment (talk) 05:55, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, considering the user's contributions and the order in which he edited them had phrased out something very inappropriate, could just as well be a reason to block him. I wouldn't call it vandalism though. Has any other user ever done this in the past? --Lightsup55 ( T | C ) 13:39, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Not that I've seen. I must say that that is clever. If only he'd use his ingenuity for something constructive. Useight (talk) 08:03, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Clearly a personal attack, which is not vandalism but could necessitate a block if it was an ongoing thing. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department} 08:11, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

"poop" Vandalism Cabal?

Anyone else starting to see an increase in vandalisms containing the word "poop" from multiple anonymous IP's? I'm noticing a trend I think. Almost as if some Anonymous-type trolling group is trying to cause trouble.

Also I've been noticing a certain type of inconspicuous vandalism of just changing one digit in random articles to make it look like it's an error correction so no one will know the difference. I remember coming across this one IP, after checking his contributions I discovered they all consisted of just changing one digit in a wide variety of unrelated articles. That kind of vandalism is so hard to catch because it's not easy to tell if the editor is really just correcting inaccurate data such as updating a sport statistic or if their intentions are malicious. -- OlEnglish (talk) 01:42, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

"Poop" has been around for a very long time. Just a bunch of kids moving through the anal stage. Revert, warn, block, ignore. bibliomaniac15 03:59, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Only Warning

I pretty much understand what vandalism is and how to respond to it, but I couldn't find any information on the "Only Warning". When is it appropriate to use this? I haven't used it yet for fear that I would use it inappropriately and overstep the bounds of a regular user out on vandalism patrol, but some times when I though it *might* be appropriate to use it are as follows (I'd appreciate general and specific feedback on this):

• A user deliberately and maliciously vandalizes with content that is also very inappropriate (cussing, insults aimed at a specific person, race, or other group).
• A user (registered or not) who has had his or her account suspended in the past very deliberately vandalizes an article, especially as in point (1).
• A user (registered or not) has received a large number of level 1 and 2 vandalism warnings without being escalated further within a reasonably short period of time. (Would this deserve an only warning, a final warning, or just an escalation to level 3?)

Arathald (talk) 16:01, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

The improper use of these sorts of 4im warnings is a common reason for the rejection of block requests at WP:AIV, so this is a great question! When we decline to block because of this, here is the standardized reply admins use a la the {{AIV}} shortcut:

User has been inappropriately warned. 4im warnings are appropriate for severe vandalism and defamation only.

Most admins follow a pretty literal interpretation of WP:BLOCK when it says "before a block is imposed, efforts should be made to educate the user about our policies and guidelines, and to warn them when their behaviour conflicts with our policies and guidelines." Keeping this in mind, in my personal opinion, your first criteria is spot-on, especially when it comes to WP:BLP articles. I am a little shaky on your #2 criteria for anonymous editors (since many IPs are highly shared), unless the IP is editing the same article that got them blocked last time. For your third criteria, I would have to say that if the edits in question are not "severe vandalism or defamation" then do not use a 4im warning; use a level three or four warning instead. Hope this helps! --Kralizec! (talk) 16:54, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that pretty much answers exactly what I was wondering; thanks for your detailed response. On a similar note, is it ever appropriate to escalate directly from level 1 to level 3 or 4 (mostly when vandalism is blatant, especially when it's obscene)? Arathald (talk) 17:01, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Again, different admins have different perspectives and interpretations of the WP:BLOCK policy; the RfA process promotes admins based on their ability to exercise good judgment, rather than the mindless enforcement of rules. That said, I suspect that most admins would be fine if warnings jumped from level one to a 4im if the vandalism warranted it. In addition to the special case that is BLP, many admins are fairly intolerant of defamation based on race, religion, gender, etc. --Kralizec! (talk) 17:36, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

See also WP:4IM if you haven't already. -- OlEnglish ^(Talk) 20:50, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

The "feed your bike biscuits" man is coming back in July!

He said on another website to me that love to turn wikipedia into a scrap pile with "tom bombadil" and "feed your bike biscuits as his catch phrase!" extend his ban, then please don't ban me for the stuff Miles did.--203.36.108.27 (talk) 23:16, 23 February 2009 (UTC)