Discouragement and You

Discussion in 'The Help Desk' started by Amaris, Jun 19, 2014.

  1. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    Hello all,
    I would like to tell you a little story, about a tool we have in our arsenal to fight spammers, troll duals (who sidestep bans to post porn, or illegal content). It's called "Discourage."

    Here's what it does:

    Suppose a banned member rejoins the board under a dual identity, and proceeds to posting the nastiest scat porn you've seen since that layover in Berlin, where you met that one fellow with the spiked collar, purple mascara, and the penchant for biting his toenails in public.

    It gets all over the fora, in the Red Room, even the Green Room, and the Help Desk.

    We catch him, ban him, and start cleaning up the mess.
    The next day, he returns under a different username. Does the same thing. We ban him, clean up his mess.

    A week later, surprise! He's back, and he's got a whole new IP and a new dual account, and by the time we catch him, he's added new horrific images to his repertoire, all lovingly plastered in some of the most visible places on the board, free for anyone's co-workers to pass by and take notice.

    This becomes a job for "Discourage." This is an actual tool option in the board's security features. What this tool does is track the aggregate IP addresses of a dual troll account, and creates a personal flood check, and also causes disruptions in the account which prevents the ability to make consecutive posts. The search engine becomes unpredictable, and the PM/Email system unreliable. It becomes more difficult for the troll to post the garbage he or she's been posting in order to disrupt the board.

    That is the discourage tool. As far as I'm concerned, that is its sole purpose. It is not used to cause issues with accounts of people we "don't like," and it's not being used on anyone who isn't a troll dual spamming the board with porn or other illegal content.

    Why am I talking about this now? Well, for several reasons. The primary reason is that there is some in the staff room who object to the use of such a tool (when the Shelter thread is released, you'll see it). Another reason is that I want you to know the tools I use to try and prevent future spam and porn attacks by those whose sole purpose is to disrupt the board out of some sense of petty vengeance. We've seen it happen, it will eventually happen again.

    Is this tool perfect? No. Will it stop every such event? Hell, no. No system is perfect, and all can be worked around. That is the nature of the internet, and how it evolves. It is, however, the best tool we have for such an occasion.

    This is a tool that is used most sparingly, and now you know it exists.
    If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them.

    John
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  2. gul

    gul Revolting Beer Drinker Administrator Formerly Important

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    One more thing to add: we have decided to use this on one individual, I'm sure you can all guess who that is. It is not something used lightly or for anybody who is a regular participant in these forums, confines trolling to the Red Room, etc.

    In other words, if you are reading this and have never tried to burn one of Garamet's books, then this tool is not about you. But in the interests of transparency, people should know it exists and that we decided to try it out on a certain Cardasian troll.
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  3. K.

    K. Sober

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    I don't think I got a very good understanding of the function you're describing.

    If we're talking about spammers, and we believe that the IP address aggregation and flood check identifies them well enough, why not just block the accounts completely? Why is there an advantage to "discouraging" further posts while not making them impossible?

    If all the posts coming from that account are spam, then we don't want any of them, not just reduce their numbers by discouraging them.

    But if it's a person who will often but not always hand out spam, this sounds as if it is likely to make their behaviour worse, and thus worsen our experience with them. There's the broken window effect (this junk website hardly works, but it's a good place to let off steam), the immediate frustration (I wanted to post in room A, but the board won't let me and has now piped me through to room C? oh, the heck with it, I'll just post that pic from the layover at Berlin then), and of course the possibility of clarity (oh, they think they can mess with me? this will show them...!).

    Again, if we think that the person is so unlikely to ever have anything useful to offer that we don't mind discouraging the few instances in which they might, it seems to be me that blocking them completely would be better for the rest of us and for them.

    Also, just to make sure, I hope your explanation doesn't mean that we can all put other posters on "discouragement", rather than just the mods? Your description makes it sound almost as if you want each of us to consider whom we'd like to discourage. Personally, I think we would be better off discouraging others in the same manner we always have, that is, by just being ourselves.
  4. Asyncritus

    Asyncritus Expert on everything

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    But I told the Asyncritters to cut back! I really did. They just won't listen. :(

    Now I'm really discouraged. I think I'll just go kill myself*. :(


    *Well, one of myself, anyway. That will cut back a little bit on the spam.
  5. Lanzman

    Lanzman Vast, Cool and Unsympathetic Formerly Important

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    :evilpop:
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  6. mburtonk

    mburtonk mburtonkulous

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    For entertainment value. I thought that was obvious.
  7. Shirogayne

    Shirogayne Gay™ Formerly Important

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    I agree with Packard. If it's one person, then why all the trouble? This boad doesn't have legion of spammers and trolls like it used to, and the last banning of someone that wasn't lesbian Shoes was Tex for that pic of bald Sokar....what, two years ago?
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  8. gul

    gul Revolting Beer Drinker Administrator Formerly Important

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    For one thing, I'd rather not permaban anybody. Otherwise, yeah, that's probably what we'd do with the book burner. But this is actually a stronger tool in my opinion, because it keeps him where we can keep an eye on him.

    However, we shall see. We already know that he sneaks back in when we ban him, so that's not completely effective anyway.
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  9. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    ^ Exactly.

    Also, Packard, the discourage tool can only be used by an Administrator.
  10. K.

    K. Sober

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    But if IP suffices to identify his new accounts in order to discourage them, it also suffices to ban him. If it doesn't and we're unsure, we shouldn't put the questioned accounts on discouragement either.

    And why do we think it will be entertaining to encourage someone to post in the manner that made us want to ban him?
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  11. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    No, because the discourage option employs several methods that are more effective than a simple IP ban.
  12. Ancalagon

    Ancalagon Scalawag Administrator Formerly Important

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    I don't like permabanning b/c it doesn't leave open the chance gor the person to prove they've moved beyond fuckery, but at the same time I don't like someone porn spamming every month or so. By constantly letting Skrain come back it seems like we semi-approve of his behavior.

    Discourage makes it clear we don't. We go long enough without the fuckery he can come off.
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  13. The Original Faceman

    The Original Faceman Lasagna Artist

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    I'm not clear on how it works. Has anyone tried it out for a test? I volunteer Dayton, if you'd like.
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  14. Tamar Garish

    Tamar Garish Wanna Snuggle? Deceased Member

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    It essentially makes your experience shitty. Slow loading, random flood controls, random search results, posts don't always work, random redirects to random threads instead of where you meant to go...all kinds of fun stuff like that. How this is supposed to fix anything is beyond me besides let people laugh when he complains about it. It's meant to make people want to leave because they can't use the board.

    Yeah, I think it's kind of squirrely to have a policy of what is essentially trolling for a punishment. I prefer cleaner methods like bans and/or flood control with image posting permissions removed than this sort of "punishment". There are lots of ways of limited the damage he can do without resorting to this. :shrug:
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  15. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    Yeah, look how well we're hiding it. You'll never find out.
  16. garamet

    garamet "The whole world is watching."

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    So this is already in place? I haven't noticed anything different. :shrug:
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  17. gul

    gul Revolting Beer Drinker Administrator Formerly Important

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    You wouldn't, as you are not discouraged from posting.
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  18. mburtonk

    mburtonk mburtonkulous

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    Are there degrees? So you can set it to 1 for someone who is mildly annoying, or up to 11 for someone for whom the connection should time out if they ever try to post?

    Can you pick and choose which problems to give people?
  19. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    That's the key. You won't notice anything different. It is passive in its deployment, and is designed to handle exactly what it's doing at the moment, which is working to prevent troll duals from disrupting the board.
  20. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    Yes, and yes. I set it so that whatever troll dual was registering to experience significant disruption, to the point where they'll either give up (preferable), or even if they do manage to register, they will have significant difficulties in posting to the point where trying to cause trouble becomes a fruitless endeavor.
  21. garamet

    garamet "The whole world is watching."

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    Ah, so Lesbian Shoes™ will be having a "shitty experience" but everyone else is unaffected. :techman:
  22. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    Anyone who is banned, and creates a dual, and uses that dual to disrupt the board will see very poor performance. The goal is to get them to realize that even though they found a way around a ban, there are other methods that will make their experience miserable, and that it's better to apologize, and request access again, rather than trying to cheat their way around it.
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  23. shootER

    shootER Insubordinate...and churlish Administrator

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    At least not by the staff. :bergman:
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  24. K.

    K. Sober

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    I still don't get it. If we feel confident that this new registration comes from a banned member, why allow it at all?
  25. Amaris

    Amaris Guest

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    Just to sum it all up, the Discourage feature works to block registrations from banned members, but should they get through, the utility has measures to disrupt their posting until one of the Admins are able to take care of it.

    Thanks for your questions, guys. :)
  26. The Original Faceman

    The Original Faceman Lasagna Artist

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    How does it identify the banned members dual? Isn't that our job?
  27. ed629

    ed629 Morally Inept Banned

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    upload_2014-6-20_18-20-55.png
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  28. Tamar Garish

    Tamar Garish Wanna Snuggle? Deceased Member

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    I never accused anyone of hiding anything. Get it through your head...this isn't personal. I personally don't like that option exists at all, on any board. I think it's becoming a big bully instead of just banning the fuckers when you find them.

    We have some posters that sometimes have the same IPs ..what happens if one of them gets punished? Will both posters experience the misery or just the troll? Or what about a situation like mine? Say Zel had some time on his hands and came back to WF. One day I have too much meds or something and porn spam up a storm illiciting the "Discouragement" treatment...what happens to Zel? We obviously have the same IP, would he be "discouraged" too, the software assuming "Zel" is a dual of "Tamar"?

    If the target gets a proxy IP, how does the software know it's him? And if the software can tell when someone is using a proxy to circumvent a ban why isn't there a method to use this detection to stop him from joining right up front?

    It seems to me taking away his ability to post pictures along with flood control would end most of the issue. Maybe even the ability to send and receive PMs except from the staff. Lock him out of the Red Room. If he wants back so much, let him with the most stripped down account possible. He can earn those privileges back over time.

    That at least has a chance to inspire some good behavior. I don't see how discouragement does that...he would be lucky to get a post to post at all most of the time. Even if he comes here one day wanting to share something decent, he may never get to as the software fucks with him and drives him away.
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  29. tafkats

    tafkats scream not working because space make deaf Moderator

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    Is there any purpose here that couldn't be achieved just by implementing flood control on a person you don't trust to not start posting penises all over the place?

    As I understand it, the original purpose of Discourage was basically to give admins a way to drive somebody away without having to justify or stand behind a ban. In this case, since it's not exactly secret, at least it's not actively deceptive ... but what purpose is there besides "it's fun to fuck with somebody we don't like"?
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  30. Ancalagon

    Ancalagon Scalawag Administrator Formerly Important

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    I don't like permabanning b/c it doesn't leave open the chance gor the person to prove they've moved beyond fuckery, but at the same time I don't like someone porn spamming every month or so. By constantly letting Skrain come back it seems like we semi-approve of his behavior.

    Discourage makes it clear we don't. We go long enough without the fuckery he can come off.