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Firstly let me thank you for the measures you have taken.
But there are also loopholes in your enforcement that allow abusers to circumvent your system and intentions. Firstly, it takes forever to get any response when a report is made.
Secondly, you know that as soon as you delete posts, new ones pop up immediately by the abusers, usually worse than before. You also know that repeat violators use multiple accounts. If you delete an account, repeat offenders just make a new username.
Thirdly, taking the measure of deactivating accounts engaged in illegal behavior is easily reversed if the offender re-validates the account using an online webpage that can recieve TXT messsages as if it were a phone. Those pages are everywhere, and they are free.
Finally, the hackers and trolls use multiple sock accounts to report perfectly valid, on-topic posts to get them deleted, and your automated system allows it.
A few simple measures would fix this problem:
1. Watermark every post with a public display of the originating IP address, as is done with every quality message board. That reduces the false sense of anonymity and therefore reduces the frequency and intensity of abuse.
2. If you delete an account, BAN the IP from whence it came, and do not let anyone create a username that matches the sequence of numbers and letters in the banned username by greater than some arbitrary percentage (say 25%). This will keep people from getting banned with "JonDoe_1" and then creating account "JonDoe_2" immediately after being deleted.
3. If you wipe an account and require re-authorization, do not allow cell phone re-authorization more than once; after that, only allow credit cards. Track the numbers of the credit cards, and if they have been used to validate an account in the past that was wiped, do not allow re-use of the same card for a different username.
4. Require that all new accounts go through a probationary period of 30 days before being allowed to post. You can easily do this without modifying code by setting the "post quota" countdown to 30 days whenever a new account is created.
5. Finally, in cases where there are threats of physical violence being made, you must lock the posts, save them, and refer these threats to Law Enforcement for the safety of your customers.
Deleting a few posts or even wiping a history means NOTHING to trolls and abusers on this website. IMDB has an ethical, legal, and fiduciary responsibility to move swiftly when threats are made, and there should be a ZERO TOLERANCE. And that means account deletion and permanent bans.
AOL only allowed three TOS violations before your account was suspended, and AOL sucked. Don't you want to aspire to be better than AOL? Regardless of the legal risks you expose yourself to by failing to act decisively in cases of stalking and abuse, the far greater price IMDB will pay for allowing such abuse is that no quality people will return to your boards, and you will end up with nothing but a but a bunch of vulgar, hateful, spiteful trolls and abusers on your site, and that's not what you really want for your company, I think, nor do I.
Finally, consider that underage children can read every post made.
And you allow people to continue to verbally abuse, harass, stalk and threaten your honest contributors using tactics and language that belongs in a strip club or a KKK rally?
Do the right thing. Please.
Thank You,
John Michael Hall
But there are also loopholes in your enforcement that allow abusers to circumvent your system and intentions. Firstly, it takes forever to get any response when a report is made.
Secondly, you know that as soon as you delete posts, new ones pop up immediately by the abusers, usually worse than before. You also know that repeat violators use multiple accounts. If you delete an account, repeat offenders just make a new username.
Thirdly, taking the measure of deactivating accounts engaged in illegal behavior is easily reversed if the offender re-validates the account using an online webpage that can recieve TXT messsages as if it were a phone. Those pages are everywhere, and they are free.
Finally, the hackers and trolls use multiple sock accounts to report perfectly valid, on-topic posts to get them deleted, and your automated system allows it.
A few simple measures would fix this problem:
1. Watermark every post with a public display of the originating IP address, as is done with every quality message board. That reduces the false sense of anonymity and therefore reduces the frequency and intensity of abuse.
2. If you delete an account, BAN the IP from whence it came, and do not let anyone create a username that matches the sequence of numbers and letters in the banned username by greater than some arbitrary percentage (say 25%). This will keep people from getting banned with "JonDoe_1" and then creating account "JonDoe_2" immediately after being deleted.
3. If you wipe an account and require re-authorization, do not allow cell phone re-authorization more than once; after that, only allow credit cards. Track the numbers of the credit cards, and if they have been used to validate an account in the past that was wiped, do not allow re-use of the same card for a different username.
4. Require that all new accounts go through a probationary period of 30 days before being allowed to post. You can easily do this without modifying code by setting the "post quota" countdown to 30 days whenever a new account is created.
5. Finally, in cases where there are threats of physical violence being made, you must lock the posts, save them, and refer these threats to Law Enforcement for the safety of your customers.
Deleting a few posts or even wiping a history means NOTHING to trolls and abusers on this website. IMDB has an ethical, legal, and fiduciary responsibility to move swiftly when threats are made, and there should be a ZERO TOLERANCE. And that means account deletion and permanent bans.
AOL only allowed three TOS violations before your account was suspended, and AOL sucked. Don't you want to aspire to be better than AOL? Regardless of the legal risks you expose yourself to by failing to act decisively in cases of stalking and abuse, the far greater price IMDB will pay for allowing such abuse is that no quality people will return to your boards, and you will end up with nothing but a but a bunch of vulgar, hateful, spiteful trolls and abusers on your site, and that's not what you really want for your company, I think, nor do I.
Finally, consider that underage children can read every post made.
And you allow people to continue to verbally abuse, harass, stalk and threaten your honest contributors using tactics and language that belongs in a strip club or a KKK rally?
Do the right thing. Please.
Thank You,
John Michael Hall
Posted 6 years ago
LuvsToResearch, Champion
So... you think because some people might be able to get around punishments, nothing should be done? Why have rules at all, then?
As far as the IP address thing, there could be an appeals system. If more than one person is affected by the ban, they could send a message to the admins and it could be opened again, perhaps for their username only (assuming it isn't the one who caused the ban).
bluesmanSF, Champion
No. She didn't say that at all. Why would you even imply that? That was quite a jump to assume she meant anything close to that.
The site used to employ IP bans. It doesn't work. I am not a techie either but can get around an IP block in seconds. It leaves innocents being blocked and allows the offender to continue.
If their IP is banned, how could they ask for appeal (assuming you're right and it can't be circumvented-and if it can be circumvented, why would they need to appeal? Just change IP)? If their IP is blocked, how could their user name become exempt? That made no sense.
The site used to employ IP bans. It doesn't work. I am not a techie either but can get around an IP block in seconds. It leaves innocents being blocked and allows the offender to continue.
If their IP is banned, how could they ask for appeal (assuming you're right and it can't be circumvented-and if it can be circumvented, why would they need to appeal? Just change IP)? If their IP is blocked, how could their user name become exempt? That made no sense.
Well, I am a techie. I have a Masters in Computer Science. And I can definitively say that the only reason you would be against IP bans is if you wished to actively support and encourage the illegal behavior of the trolls.
IP bans DO work, for the simple fact that most ISPs assign STATIC IP Addresses to cable and Fiber Op subscribers these days because the connections are more permanent and long lasting. Back in the days of dial-up, when connectivity ranged in the minutes to hours range, Dynamic IPs were more common than they are now.
The bottom line is that if you ban a specific IP address, you are only disabling that specific IP address from logging on again. Therefore, if the IP is static, you have accomplished your goal. If the IP is dynamic, you needn't worry about punishing innocents, because only a single person could possibly be affected at a time, and if they found that their ability to connect to IMDB was impeded, all they'd have to do is what people do every day when they have a connectivity problem, reset the connection! Bam, new IP address, and Problem solved.
A better solution might be to BAN offending IP addresses for 24 hours, which matches the usual TTL (Time-To-Live) for a dynamically assigned IP address anyway. That way, the troll or abuser would loose connectivity for 24 hours at least, and if an offender thought they might loose connectivity for 24 hours every time their bad behavior forced an admin to review their misdeeds personally, I assure you that would cut down considerably on repeat offences.
One simple measure is this: if more than one username is connected from the same IP at the same time, that IP gets instantly banned for 24 hours and both (or more, if more are involved) accounts get deleted due to sock-puppet-abuse.
Another good option would be to make the "ignore" function 2-WAY. Right now it favors the offender, because once a stalker or harasser is ignored by a target, the offender can still read the posts of the target, glean personal information from the target's posts and profile, unfairly report the targets legitimate on-topic posts using multiple sock accounts until they are deleted by the automated system, etc. There are instruction manuals out there on the internet on how to harass people by doing this.
The "ignore" function needs to graduate to a "BLOCK" function, like on FaceBook, so a user can BLOCK an offender. That way, they ignore the offender and the offender is FORCED to ignore them, their username, their post history, ALL their information and activities, etc. If they use a different account, they get BLOCKED again. Simple.
These are fixes that can be implemented in less than 24 hours.
IP bans DO work, for the simple fact that most ISPs assign STATIC IP Addresses to cable and Fiber Op subscribers these days because the connections are more permanent and long lasting. Back in the days of dial-up, when connectivity ranged in the minutes to hours range, Dynamic IPs were more common than they are now.
The bottom line is that if you ban a specific IP address, you are only disabling that specific IP address from logging on again. Therefore, if the IP is static, you have accomplished your goal. If the IP is dynamic, you needn't worry about punishing innocents, because only a single person could possibly be affected at a time, and if they found that their ability to connect to IMDB was impeded, all they'd have to do is what people do every day when they have a connectivity problem, reset the connection! Bam, new IP address, and Problem solved.
A better solution might be to BAN offending IP addresses for 24 hours, which matches the usual TTL (Time-To-Live) for a dynamically assigned IP address anyway. That way, the troll or abuser would loose connectivity for 24 hours at least, and if an offender thought they might loose connectivity for 24 hours every time their bad behavior forced an admin to review their misdeeds personally, I assure you that would cut down considerably on repeat offences.
One simple measure is this: if more than one username is connected from the same IP at the same time, that IP gets instantly banned for 24 hours and both (or more, if more are involved) accounts get deleted due to sock-puppet-abuse.
Another good option would be to make the "ignore" function 2-WAY. Right now it favors the offender, because once a stalker or harasser is ignored by a target, the offender can still read the posts of the target, glean personal information from the target's posts and profile, unfairly report the targets legitimate on-topic posts using multiple sock accounts until they are deleted by the automated system, etc. There are instruction manuals out there on the internet on how to harass people by doing this.
The "ignore" function needs to graduate to a "BLOCK" function, like on FaceBook, so a user can BLOCK an offender. That way, they ignore the offender and the offender is FORCED to ignore them, their username, their post history, ALL their information and activities, etc. If they use a different account, they get BLOCKED again. Simple.
These are fixes that can be implemented in less than 24 hours.
(Edited)
