SkepticAnonymous

SkepticAnonymous (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Populated account categories: confirmed · suspected
For archived investigations, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/SkepticAnonymous/Archive.


26 January 2021

– This SPI case is open.

Suspected sockpuppets

Here IHateAccounts indicated that they were the same person as 2601:2C0:C300:B7:9922:D361:2E74:D5EF (talk+ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · spi block · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log)), an editor using an IPv6 /64 range geolocating to Houston, Texas. (See Special:Contributions/2601:2C0:C300:B7:9922:D361::/64) SkepticAnonymous is known to use Houston-based IPs. IHA and SkepticAnonymous apparently share the view that Wikipedia should be used to expose the sins of American right-wing or libertarian figures: see for example IHA's contributions here, here, here, and here. IHA and SA have the same sort of angry approach; in particular, both revert ordinary, civil posts to their user talk pages with edit summaries along the lines of "remove abusive harassment by a terrible person".

Example diffs
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

SkepticAnonymous and socks:

  • [1] remove vandalism by liars, frauds, and especially [username] the master liar of a FRAME JOB who IMPERSONATED ME.
  • [2] Remove uncivil insults mischaracterizing my edits by [username]
  • [3] Clean up and remove harassment tactic posts by [username].
  • [4] Remove harassment message. [username], you were pinged to the article talk page, how about PARTICIPATING instead of harassing, hmmm?
  • [5] remove harassing note from user who is engaged in dishonest tag-bombing

IHateAccounts:

  • [6] Remove trolling from bad faith troll.
  • [7] remove what appears to be fairly obvious trolling, I'm not going to respond to that.
  • [8] remove obviously harassing behavior
  • [9] Remove person enabling obvious harassment behavior
  • [10] remove disgusting, insulting personal attack
  • [11] revert; user obviously has WP:CIR issues with source evaluation
  • [12] remove obvious trolling from someone who thinks misgendering is ok.

gnu57 09:28, 26 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by other users

Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.

  • "undo xyz" (present tense), as opposed to the more common "rv/revert" or "undid": [20] [21][22]
  • Using a single spaced hyphen as a separator in edit summaries: [23] [24] [25] [26] vs. [27] [28] [29]
  • Typing in caps when angry, (note the "PLEASE"): [30] vs. [31] [32]
  • More generally speaking, the edit summaries are broadly similar in that both capitalisation of the first letter and punctuation are inconsistent and that they are used similarly frequently; edits in project- and talkspace often come without them.
  • Not entirely edit-summary based, but both IHA and the suspected master make references to bullying; see Special:Permalink/998720639 and [33] [34]

None of this is conclusive on its own and I haven't examined the IP edits, but I did want to point it out – make of it what you will. Best, Blablubbs|talk 19:47, 26 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't get a chance to finish writing this. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 02:36, 27 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Sro23: So here's where I am at; if this block is based at all on similar POV pushing, then that falls out the window when you take a look a look the underlying tactics, motivations, and editing interests between the two users.
You have IHA who is a social justice type who generally hangs around in projectspace rather than dealing with content. Edits are almost exclusively based around BLPs and current events topics. The users that IHA gets into the most fights with are similarly relatively new (Swag Lord, 3Kingdoms, etc).
Then you have SkepticAnonymous who primarily edited on topics like the Oath Keepers, Chris Kyle, United Daughters of the Confederacy, and Citizens for Constitutional Freedom. While there is some overlap- Sean Hannity, Kris Kobach, Mansplaining, Unite The Right Rally, etc. are all articles I could see IHA editing today- we would expect at least some moderate recidivism in a potential SA sock's activity. What do I mean?
Well, when I became IHA's mentor, I opened up my articles to them as potential safe areas for them to contribute. I said here's what I've written in American politics; no one will bother you if you try to improve these articles. The suggested articles included List of militia organizations in the United States and List of presidents of the National Rifle Association which the former being an article which I highly doubt an SA sock could not resist contributing to. What was IHA's level of interest? None.
As for List of the NRA presidents, IHA seemed similarly disinterested. They only contributed a bit after excessive prodding on my part because I have it up for FLC. IHateAccounts ignored my ping there and didn't display any amount of POV pushing. Again, this is not what one would expect out of a potential SA sock. If this was SkepticAnonymous, these would have been the absolute free pass to edit the article however they want without raising any suspicion. Did. Not. Happen.
People change interests over years, but they don't completely drop previous interests. Not like this. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 15:24, 27 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
My tentative conclusion is that while the two accounts certainly have some surface-level similarities ("strong willed leftists who get kind of angry"), I don't think that the behavioral evidence presented above is enough to link these accounts and warrant a ban. There are some linguistic/behavioral similarities between IHA and previous SA socks, but there are just as many linguistic/behavioral differences (for more general behavioral differences see MJL's reports about mentoring IHA and their editing choices). The diffs I've presented certainly don't rule out a connection; one explanation consistent with accusations of socking could be that SA, in the window of time between C-137 and IHA, picked up the lingo of other editors and became calmer, more sensitive, and more genderqueer. However, this doesn't seem likely to me. I've never (to my knowledge) interacted with SA, but I've bumped into IHA a few times on various articles and looking at SA's diffs, IHA doesn't seem like the same person.
I apologize for the large amount of diffs and the wall of text. I've tried to be as concise as I can. I'd also love to hear others' interpretations of the diffs I've presented, as my analysis may be completely off-the-mark. I'll update this if I find anything else, whether it helps or hurts IHA's case. Srey Srostalk 01:12, 28 January 2021 (UTC) updated 07:18, 28 January 2021 (UTC) and 17:21, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Point #3 alone shows that the socks are capable of changing certain elements of their behaviour in just one year. Comparing with a 2015-2016 sock account thus seems to be a fallacy, rather than comparing with the newer socks. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 07:32, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@ProcrastinatingReader: You make a very good point. What caused that was that I initially was doing the analysis without the C-137 account (I accidentally merged it with C-139 in my list) and so didn't see the newer posts. Even compared with the newer socks, the switch from ((replyto)) and ((ping)) to ((reply)) seems like it could be significant. Srey Srostalk 07:49, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
How so? From 2015 to 2016 the sock stopped using yo and started using replyto and ping. So isn't it feasible that from 2016 to 2020 they stopped using replyto and ping and started using reply? ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 07:54, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I guess what stands out to me is that the change from yo to replyto and ping happened gradually over the span of two accounts and many edits, while as far as I can tell, even though there was a decent-sized gap in time between the replyto/ping edits and the first IHA IP edits I can find, IHA has basically used reply 100% of the time. The assumption that I'm making here is that editing habits change while editing, rather than just over time. Unless there are other socks that we haven't caught that made this change gradually, IHA seems like an outlier here. Srey Srostalk 17:10, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
But for IHA, 100% of the time is only a three-month period. Too short to measure a gradual change. While I'm here and since you asked, I also find #1 unpersuasive, because you're comparing one person's behavior with what you think another person would or would not do, and that other person, you've only known (correct me if I'm wrong) from interacting on the internet for three months. That's not enough time to know someone well enough to accurately predict their behavior, especially if all interactions have been only via text. I agree with PR about #3 also. The other points I think are interesting, but overall, it's damn near impossible to prove that one person is not another person. Similarities can be hard to explain away, but differences can easily be explained, and in fact we know that SA socks sometimes show differences in behavior. I imagine all long term socks do, as it's easy to act like someone else online (no one knows you're a dog...). So I'm cognizant that what you're trying to do, "prove" innocence, is an almost impossible task.
While I'm here, two things...
  1. I understand IHA edited as an IP prior to registering an account, and that they edited as an IP for a long time (and this is public). Why isn't anyone looking at IHA's IP edits for comparison? How long did IHA edit as an IP? Did they overlap with any SA socks? I imagine there is more relevant behavioral evidence in the IP's contribs that may be helpful to look at.
  2. I'm not a CU or admin or anything, but for my part I'm not much persuaded one way or the other by comparisons of minutiae like word choice in edit summaries. For example, both editors talk about bullying and gaslighting, but so have I, so have thousands of others. I sometimes use "rv" or "revert" or "undo", there is no rhyme or reason to it, and I know thousands of others do, too. I'm much more persuaded by big-picture behavior analysis such as what MJL presented. My question is: what did SA do with their socks? Did they edit the same articles? Bother the same editors? Pursue the same disputes? Push the same POV? What was the purpose of the socks? And then, did IHA do those same things or pursue the same purpose? If IHA fought the same fights that SA did, then that's persuasive evidence that they're connected. Conversely, if IHA did not fight any of the same fights as SA, then what would the point be of SA creating the IHA account? Particularly where IHA had previously edited as an IP, apparently for a while, and without getting busted as an SA sock (assuming that's the case in the first place)... it makes no sense that someone successfully socking as an IP would go and create an account and continue to sock but not pursue any of their old disputes. That's illogical. I would think any behavioral evidence would link the purpose of the two accounts, not just their language.
Another long post from Levivich harass/hound 17:29, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Levivich: (1) The thing that I always found weird about IHA is that they were the most aggressive towards fellow newbies, even in private with me. That's why I think the interaction ban with Swag Lord is pretty telling here. If you are an SA sock, you know which editors have been around long term and hold an opposing POV to you; you don't waste your time on the newbies. That isn't to say SA would ignore newbies per se, but I would've expected the focus to be on the more tenured editors.
(2) The sad and funny and tragic part of this to me is that if you accept that SA is IHA, then you're still admitting that this user (A) did not re-engage in old conduct disputes with users, (B) tempered their language quite significantly (see what they said in 2019), (C) stayed away from most of their original secondary topic areas (Texas history, Rick and Morty, etc.), (D) hasn't socked since creating this latest account on the advice of multiple admins and arbs, and (E) made a completely new identity for themself as a young person who occasionally takes bath bombs. (edit conflict) –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 18:21, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Levivich: what did SA do with their socks Generally speaking attacked perceived conservative editors (such as a Pearland, TX IP calling someone a "conservatroll"), adding negative information about right-wing politicians (such as a Pearland IP adding alleged white supremacy links to Steve Scalise). Compare this with IHA adding links about white nationalism to Madison Cawthorn and a Pearland IP – the one we know preceded IHA's account – attacking Masem for "disgusting troll level dishonesty". Many of the archived IPs have been blocked, identified with socking and had their attacks rev-deleted. These can be found in the SPI archives. I noticed that the wireless Sprint PCS broadband IPs geolocate to Houston, TX, but the fixed line Comcast IPs geolocate to Pearland, TX with the same postal code. Mobile internet geolocations can be wildly inaccurate, but some fixed line broadband geolocations can be very accurate because they trace to a postal code. What are the odds that there are several Wikipedia users who pop-up to attack perceived right-wing editors as trolls or bullies, specialize in white nationalism allegations and end up being blocked for personal attacks based in Pearland? --Pudeo (talk) 19:58, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
...but the fact that the IPs geolocate to Pearland doesn't mean that the users are in Pearland, right? Could be anywhere in the vicinity, and the vicinity is Greater Houston, population 7 million, which is larger than most countries. I think the chances that there are more than one "strong willed leftists who get kind of angry" in Houston is extremely high, and since Wikipedia editors are a self-selecting group, I bet that out of the thousands of people from Houston who have edited Wikipedia, more than half would self-identify as anti-right-wing or anti-white-nationalism or something like that. Like what are the chances there are two leftists in Hong Kong (7.5 mil)? Or Denmark (6 mil)? Having the same POV and geolocating to the same place doesn't strike me as particularly persuasive evidence. Levivich harass/hound 20:24, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Pudeo, you're leaving out some key facts here. One of thesAe users has focused on a single topic area to a super precise degree while the other always had secondary topic areas to fall back on. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 23:01, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding point 5, I suspect you are correct around this being common. I offer my own editing history as an example, and although I mainly use "rv", a glance at my recent edits shows I also use "undo [x]" sometimes as well: [130], [131] [132]. GorillaWarfare (talk) 17:01, 28 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Tangential discussion
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
  • I agree with Sro23's comment, below. We seem now to be undergoing a lot of self-contortions to try to overturn a block based on a reasonably solid triangulation of technical and behavioral indicators, neither of which may be sufficient proof on their own but which - when taken in concert - makes the case of socking likely. If IHA registers a new unblock request it will depend on it being registered at the precise moment that an unrecused admin who believes this is a bad block is online and able to remedy it. With the majority of SPI regulars completely uninvolved in this conversation, an unblock request registered at any other moment would probably just result in a second decline. I presume, therefore, that the reason we have not seen a second unblock request, despite the user's editing pattern up to this point indicating usually daily log-ins, is that it is either (a) being tactically withheld, (b) the account is now abandoned and a new sockpuppet has already been generated and is currently editing elsewhere. In either of those cases, reopening this investigation is only likely to reward disruptive behavior, whatever its genesis. Chetsford (talk) 17:28, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    Wow that's a crazy lien of argument. Here are the premises you lay out:
    A. If IHA registers a new unblock request it will depend on it being registered at the precise moment that an unrecused admin who believes this is a bad block is online and able to remedy it.
    B. Because ... an unblock request registered at any other moment would probably just result in a second decline
    And your conclusion from those premises is that IHA hasn't posted a second unblock request because either:
    1. tactically withheld, or
    2. account is now abandoned and a new sockpuppet has already been generated and is currently editing elsewhere
    What's amazing to me is that you did not seem to even consider these other, extremely obvious, possibilities:
    3. IHA isn't posting a second unblock request because, as you said, doing so will depend on it being registered at the precise moment that an unrecused admin who believes this is a bad block is online and able to remedy it and an unblock request registered at any other moment would probably just result in a second decline ... so who would make a second unblock request under those conditions?
    4. They abandoned the project... meaning, they abandoned the account and did not start a new one. Because of being fed up.
    Reopening the investigation will only reward disruptive behavior if you believe there has been disruptive behavior, but that's what this investigation is supposed to find out. So one can't really argue that investigating the crime rewards the criminal, as it were, unless one presupposes the outcome of said investigation.
    Here's the thing about reopening investigations: do we have something to hide? Some reason we need to stop people from discussing this matter? As you said, the majority of SPI regulars completely uninvolved in this conversation, so it's not taking up any of their time. If people want to volunteer to dig deeper, why fault them for that? Aren't you, like me, and the rest of us, interested in finding the truth? Levivich harass/hound 18:32, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Aren't you, like me, and the rest of us, interested in finding the truth?" Who is this "the rest of us" to which you refer? As far as I can tell, most of us here believe "the truth" has already been found and we don't need another recount. Chetsford (talk) 19:04, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    Might want to take a second look... I count four editors on this page saying they think IHA is SA's sock. That's not most, that's less than half. Levivich harass/hound 19:13, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm getting different numbers. We'll have to agree to disagree. Chetsford (talk) 19:16, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    We don't need to agree to disagree about easily-ascertained facts, such as the number of people commenting here. The four editors who have said IHA = SA are Guerillero, Pudeo, Sro, and you. The other editors who have commented here are me, GW, MJL, PR, GN, Srey Sros, and Blablubbs. I'm not counting Mkdw as a participant, and even if you count the filer, gnu, in the first group, the first group is still a numerical minority. Your statement, most of us here believe "the truth" has already been found, is demonstrably incorrect. Levivich harass/hound 19:27, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"I'm not counting Mkdw as a participant, and even if you count the filer, gnu, in the first group, the first group ..." I feel a sudden empathy with American judges over the last couple months. Chetsford (talk) 20:01, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Chetsford: That's some major WP:ABF right there. The behavoiral evidence has not been solid, and according to CaptainEek the technical evidence is not particularly strong either.
If you absolutely MUST know where IHA has been, they've been incredibly sick and distressed because of these events. Throwing up and the like. Nothing good. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 18:09, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"That's some major WP:ABF right there." That's incorrect. ABF requires an assumption be made. It doesn't apply here as we are discussing an editor who is, in fact, actually blocked as a sockpuppet at this very moment. AGF does not proscribe us from acknowledging reality.
"The behavoiral evidence has not been solid" I disagree. The behavioral evidence is solid.
"... they've been incredibly sick and distressed because of these events. Throwing up and the like." I'm sorry to hear that. Chetsford (talk) 18:54, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
 Clerk note: Chetsford, Levivich: please keep comments here directly related to answering the question "are IHA and SA the same person" rather than meta-commentary on IHA's unblock requests and the trend of the current discussion. GeneralNotability (talk) 20:01, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"Four days after that, we get our first user talk message" Their first Talk comment [139] is to accuse another editor of being "utterly dishonest" - that seems behavioraly consistent with the first Talk messages left by the socks which consistently start by accusing other editors of various prejudices, such as having secret "ulterior motive[s]" [140] or being "pro-woo ... rogue admins" [141], etc. My first Talk comment was not to come out swinging, making wild accusations against other editors and, perhaps I'm overly idealistic or naive, but I don't think this is the behavioral pattern we'd typically associate with a wide-eyed, innocent puppy new to the world. Chetsford (talk) 04:43, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Chetsford: I didn't say WP:WikiPuppy, but I did say wolfcub. They're known to bite a lot since they're still teething.
Either way, IHA was directly admonishing a user for inappropriately hatting their comments. Was it civil? No, definitely not. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 05:00, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I was using puppy as a general colloquialism. (I don't really keep up with the WikiFauna thing.) Chetsford (talk) 05:10, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@In actu: Unlike you, I don't have access to the other technical data, so I picked the place that I knew IHA has edited before (because they've returned to it). The late September edit showed a continuous and unbroken chain of edits. Besides that, I have some private reasonings behind not including the June edit (besides it being on mobile) and the three May edits at the very least. (edit conflict) –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 05:15, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Guerillero: Look, like I said I got some private external reasons for doubting the ownership of those edits. It's not that these details specifically exclude the possibility that those were IHA, but it gives me some pause to say one way or the other.
Therefore, for the purposes of what I am trying to say I started with Talk:Proud Boys. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 07:03, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The earliest edits on the range actually seem to be these, which are a bunch of egregious POV-pushing BLP violations which were all reverted. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 12:24, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
👍 Like Scorpions13256 (talk) 17:08, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Blablubbs: lots of people using that UA Um.. Literally no one has said anything about them sharing a similar UA (if anything, they're probably different given that this is is a ((likely)) and not a ((confirmed)).
lots of people exhibiting certain linguistical quirks As has been shown by multiple people, these two users don't share similar linguistics quirks. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 17:19, 30 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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