MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist/archives/December 2011

=Proposed additions=

iansomerhalder.us


Spanish language fansite for Ian Somerhalder, being added by various IPs, so warnings don't help. If there are other options (Editfilter?), please advise. Thanks. --Ebyabe (talk) 21:12, 7 September 2011 (UTC)
 * User:XLinkBot is an alternative. It doesn't block sites, but reverts them once they are added. ~Amatulić (talk) 23:40, 7 September 2011 (UTC)
 * That could work. I'll propose it there. Thanks! --Ebyabe (talk) 01:37, 8 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Link has been globally blacklisted . This user was spamming various fansites which happened to be owned by the same person. See m:User:COIBot/XWiki/iansomerhalder.us for the COIbot xwiki report. EdBever (talk) 20:00, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

runyoncanyon-losangeles.com
This is a fan site with advertisements and merchandise but little actual content. It has been spammed persistently and misrepresented as an "official website" by the webmaster, user:Asaporito90046. He has said he will continue adding it.  Will Beback   talk    04:51, 18 September 2011 (UTC)




 * I'm withdrawing this request. It's not the most urgent case and seems to have settled down.   Will Beback    talk    10:53, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

xifle.com


Multiple IPs have tried repeatedly to add this link to articles about porn sites SuicideGirls, MET ART, Reality Kings, and others, by replacing the official site link in the article.


 * Spammers

For all of these IPs, these are their only edits. postdlf (talk) 15:39, 20 October 2011 (UTC)
 * also
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:48, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

nopainheadache.com
Being added to many pages by many different IPs. It appears to be a blog and as such is neither a RS nor an appropriate EL.-- Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:58, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

referencethailand.com
Persistent spamming both from registered users (sockpuppets) and by IP. Spamvertized site contains no information additional information to Wikipedia articles. Accounts/IPs used, list might be incomplete since it was going on for longer time already, but only recently got more persistent: * andy (talk) 09:13, 13 October 2011 (UTC)




 * MER-C 12:11, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:53, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

cerebralfrenzy.blogspot.com
Repeated addition of spam links from this blog to multiple articles, disguised as references. --Biker Biker (talk) 08:08, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
 * another;
 * Clearly added as WP:REFSPAM, however blogspot.com links are already on xlinkbot. If more of these links are added we should consider adding it here. Thanks for the report., for now--Hu12 (talk) 16:11, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Clearly added as WP:REFSPAM, however blogspot.com links are already on xlinkbot. If more of these links are added we should consider adding it here. Thanks for the report., for now--Hu12 (talk) 16:11, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

www.globalenergysystems.co.uk
User has been spamming for almost a year: Joja lozzo  14:02, 3 October 2011 (UTC)
 * 11:05, October 3, 2011 Air source heat pumps
 * 16:58, September 7, 2011 Air source heat pumps
 * 16:53, July 15, 2011 Heat pump
 * 09:09, May 18, 2011 Heat pump
 * 13:04, January 26, 2011 Air source heat pumps
 * 14:04, December 22, 2010 Air source heat pumps
 * 17:49, November 18, 2010 Heat pump
 * User was blocked with no incidents of continued spamming since. If continues, please report back. --Hu12 (talk) 14:55, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

eventspakistan.com
IPs



Diffs


 * Diff 1
 * Diff 2
 * Diff 3
 * Diff 4

Alex Muller 17:50, 5 October 2011 (UTC)
 * also
 * WikiProject_Spam/LinkReports/eventspakistan.com
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 14:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

askacronym.com
IP address hopping editor has repeatedly spammed this link on Acronym and initialism and List of acronyms and initialisms, despite requests for discussion and two sections on the Acronym and initialism talk page explaining why the link doesn't belong there. Editor refuses to discuss the external link, and blocking will not work, as the editor does not edit more than once from any given IP address. Semi-protecting the article doesn't seem effective, as removing the editor's ability to reinsert the link without discussion would solve the problem without limiting the ability of other IP editors to edit the article, and would hopefully cause the editor to stop and discuss the external link. - SudoGhost 05:42, 10 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Adsense google_ad_client pub-9635381516352329
 * Accounts
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:33, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

hmgdesigns.net
Repeated spamming at Bánh mì:
 * 13:04, 11 October 2011,
 * 15:58, 26 September 2011,
 * 18:53, 29 August 2011,
 * 18:53, 29 August 2011,


 * 18:36, 3 July 2011.
 * 18:36, 3 July 2011.

Joja lozzo  14:39, 11 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Also from Michael Hill's Web Design Portfolio;
 * related Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam/2011_Archive_Aug_1
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:49, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:49, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:49, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

indiareport.com


I've discovered a single IP spamming this across several pages, and then several other articles including superfluous reposts of what appear to AP articles.— Ryulong ( 竜龙 ) 09:19, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Related; Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam/2010_Archive_Oct_2
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 16:59, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

bhojaldham.org

 * links


 * accounts


 * prior reports
 * Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam/2011_Archive_Oct_1

Sockpuppetry to repeatedly re-insert commercial site and a blog front-end for the commercial site into multiple articles. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 18:39, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 17:13, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

livemedical.net
This blog is being added by many different users all editing in the same style. As it is not an appropriate medical source can we add it to the black list? Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 11:35, 19 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Adsense pub-1729775033385340


 * Also:


 * Spammers
 * Spammer used URL shorteners
 * Spammer used URL shorteners


 * Checkuser requested. MER-C 12:04, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Adding these. --Dirk Beetstra T C 12:12, 19 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Additional domains from the checkuser results:


 * Possibly related domains
 * MER-C 03:00, 20 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Checkuser results. MER-C 06:11, 20 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Checkuser results. MER-C 06:11, 20 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Also added. --Dirk Beetstra T  C 07:49, 20 October 2011 (UTC)


 * I cleaned up the refspam from the articles that had any of these domains. I'd say this case is ✅. ~Amatulić (talk) 19:19, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Sneak JavaScript dhlsna.com/


It has been suggested to me by WhatamIdoing that I take this suspect link here. The link executes a JavaScript which surreptitiously attempts to connect the user's computer to PayPal over an encrypted channel. This connection attempt would be undetected by the normal user; I only found it because Little Snitch gave a message that an attempt was made to link my computer to www.paypal.com through TPC port 443 https, a request I naturally denied. I removed the link but another editor restored it. (I note that the source of the link has been edited as recently as 11 October.) Whether the script is malicious or harmless, it attempts to operate without the knowledge of the user. A general issue is whether links with JavaScript should be deleted from Wikipedia or if a warning should be given of the danger of having one's computer compromised by them. Xxanthippe (talk) 01:46, 11 October 2011 (UTC).


 * I don't see the problem. This sort of thing is common in many web pages. You'd be surprised how many pages "surreptitiously" connect to Facebook, for example. Examining the source of that dhlsna.com page, it appears that the connection to PayPal is simply for the purpose of retrieving both the Javascript code and a small button image via https. The Javascript code likely has an OnLoad call that executes automatically to initialize itself (and possibly load more code from PayPal) after being fetched.


 * Any site that integrates external features, whether it be PayPal, Facebook, Google Maps, or whatever, will do something similar. The whole point in this case is to execute the Javascript when the user clicks on the PayPal button. Nothing malicious about that.


 * You should be be more suspicious if the PayPal code was being fetched from the site's own server rather than from PayPal. This site is using standard best practices. ~Amatulić (talk) 15:14, 11 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the trouble you have taken to look into this matter. When I linked to the site on 7 October, it immediately wanted to link to PayPal before the "Pay" button was clicked. As I mentioned, the site was edited on 11 October, and this feature may have been removed then. It seems to have restored by the edit of the site of 12 October. Xxanthippe (talk) 23:20, 11 October 2011 (UTC).


 * Well, that's normal behavior, as I tried to explain above. While the page is loading, your browser sees external links to load some additional javascript and a graphic image of a button. So naturally it will go off and immediately fetch them from PayPal before the page finishes loading. It may wait to load the image, but it will fetch the Javascript immediately because browsers execute Javascript as the page loads. In this case both the external Javascript and the image are specified using the https (secure) protocol, which is appropriate if there is any data in the returned script specific to the site owner's PayPal account.


 * It is also possible for the fetched Javascript to fetch additional scripts while executing. I know Google Maps does this. I wouldn't be surprised if PayPal did too. As I said, the purpose of all this is to have an interface ready for the user when the PayPal button is clicked. ~Amatulić (talk) 01:11, 12 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for this further explanation. Xxanthippe (talk) 01:31, 12 October 2011 (UTC).

Hello, I think I'm the offending party--please forgive any newbie blunders. I'd like to thank Amatulic for his defense on the PayPal issue. I've now created a Wikipedia account, and I'm still in the process of learning proper procedure, criteria, and communication methods for Wikipedia so please bear with me as I try to explain why I added the external links to the Lawrence pages.

I'm the Webmaster for the D.H. Lawrence Society of North America (DHLSNA), a non-profit academic society, one of a handful of International Lawrence Societies around the world. We sponser International D.H. Lawrence Conferences, have yearly Lawrence panels at the Modern Language Association (MLA) conferences, publish a biannual newsletter for our members (who are among the top Lawrence scholars working today), so of course we have PayPal on our website to collect membership dues and conference fees (the Lawrence Ranch fundraising was aimed at members in honor of deceased scholars). However, most of our website is open to the public (except for the Directory listing containing member contact info), and we are continually adding new content which we feel benefits anyone doing Lawrence research.

In particular we have a page that lists women Lawrentian scholars and their publications for those interested in the feminist take on Lawrence. And we have the essays contained in the National Register of Historic Places nomination for the D.H. Lawrence Ranch (both a printable pdf version and a web-version). These essays contain biographies of Lawrence and his wife, Frieda, discuss his experiences in America and on the ranch, his works of literature produced at the ranch, Lawrence's influence on the Taos art colony and other American writes, and the uses of the ranch today. Its accuracy has been approved by the DHLSNA and by several of the State Historical Preservation Officers. It is a non-copyrighted government document that the DHLSNA has published on our website, and we would like to make it available to the general public as supplemental information about Lawrence. I feel that this particular page is especially appropriate for the Wikipedia entry on the "D.H. Lawrence Ranch," since that page uses as a reference Art Bachrach's book, "D.H. Lawrence in New Mexico." On page 46-47 of Bachrach's book, he writes: "In 2003, the D.H. Lawrence Society of North America submitted a proposal to the Cultural Properties Review Committee of New Mexico for historic registry of the ranch, a proposal that was unanimously approved and forwarded with recommendation for National Historic Register and National Historic Landmark status.  The National Register of Historic Places entered the ranch into the registry in January 2004.  The comprehensive proposal was supported by many members of the society and was prepared by Tina Ferris and Virginia Hyde.  New assessments, measurements, and other records were necessary for this proposal, and many details in the following descriptions of the ranch come from this extensive document." That would be us--we are the primary source! And our goal isn't self-promotion for our society but rather to provide this additional in-depth information to students and improve Wikipedia's scope. If you need further credentials, please let me know what they are, and I'll provide them. I'm a published Independent Lawrence scholar and elected officer in the DHLSNA. Dr. Virginia Hyde of Washington State University is also a published scholar, a Cambridge edition editor of Lawrence's "Mornings in Mexico," and past president of the DHLSNA.

The following webpage provides a history of the DHLSNA: http://dhlsna.com/History.htm and here's the page with the ranch essays: http://dhlsna.com/RanchIntro.htm

Please reconsider allowing us to link to the Wikipedia pages on author D.H. Lawrence and The D.H. Lawrence Ranch.

Thank you for your diligence and for your consideration, Tina Ferris TFerris (talk) 19:16, 21 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Tina, your site is mentioned on this talk page only because of a potential issue with malicious Javascript, which appears to be a false alarm. The description of your organization isn't relevant or necessary, and could be considered promotion, which isn't allowed on Wikipedia. But since you're new and you wrote it in good faith, we'll let it slide.


 * Your site is not blacklisted. However, since you clearly have a conflict of interest, I recommend that you refrain from linking your site in any Wikipedia articles. Please propose such links on the article talk pages. Thanks, and I hope you enjoy your participation. ~Amatulić (talk) 19:24, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Just for closure, the suggestion the OP may have made to add this site to the blacklist is. ~Amatulić (talk) 19:22, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

sangkrit.net


There is a concerted effort (likely by one user on multiple IPs) to add a particular inline document from this domain hereinto the Linus Torvalds article.

It is not relevant to the article; it is a purpose document for building "cloud business" written in hideous English by something called Open Knowledge Campus based in Mumbai - the connection to Torvalds is that he and several other computing pioneers are mentioned in a history section in this particular PDF. Said addition has been moved around in the article to try to get it kept - first it was an "Educational" recognition of Torvalds, then it was used a claim to the "Law of Linus", then it was added to a Google Books reference to the very beginning of Torvalds' biography and put in the lede.

There are currently three IPs doing this, and these are SPAs who only make this edit or corrections/changes to it:
 * Spammers



The edit has been reverted by several editors, including myself. I added a section on the talk page the second time I reverted it, and no discussion was generated.
 * Actions

The page has been semi-protected. However, that is not permanent, and doesn't stop said spammers from registering an SPA and making the same edits. MSJapan (talk) 16:03, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

flaggenlexikon.de


I found an IP having added a bunch of links to this site, which is not a reliable source and in addition links to a site that sells flags. See, in this case this edit. I'm about to start looking for more instances of this link. Blocking it would be a good idea. Drmies (talk) 18:26, 29 October 2011 (UTC)
 * The site used to be added in the good old days, before we had reliable sources, as a reference, by various editors. Recent spammy insertions (templated, with German wiki disclaimer) come from IPs in the 58 range, e.g., 58.8.240.11 and 58.8.225.17 and 58.8.91.58. I am convinced now that there is/was a concerted spam effort going on. Drmies (talk) 18:50, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

darjeelingteaxpress.com

 * Darjeelingteaxpress.com has been continuously spamming Darjeeling tea page for one year now starting from Nov. 2010. I checked the history and found more than 25 times continuous spamming result on the Darjeeling tea page inspite of being deleted by editors. The Darjeeling tea discussion page has indirectly addressed this spamming issue, but the spam site has paid no heed. A recent spam was again done on Oct. 29, 2011. History of their domain spamming can be seen on the following sections: user_talk:Shal83, Special:Contributions/Darjeelingteaxpress , Special:Contributions/Shal83 , Special:Contributions/14.98.173.105 Such spam sites should be banned from Wikipedia Subashishs (talk) 03:28, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

alpybus.com

 * Posted by various IPs and removed with warnings 7 times in Verbier since 10/28/2010 with increasing frequency recently. Postings include the URL and bare link in the body of the article. Spammers have not communicated with other editors so there's no reason to expect this to stop. Joja  lozzo  17:31, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

axisandalliesworldclub.net


See

I eliminated it from the same article several times, but IP addresses keep coming back at times and adding links to sites that host illegal copies of the game for people to download. Please add these sites to the blacklist. http://www.axisandalliesworldclub.net and http://ewarzone.com/  D r e a m Focus  21:02, 2 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Not a large spam run, as these things go. Let's monitor a while to see if it crops up again. For now, I have protected the articles Axis & Allies (1998 video game) as well as Axis & Allies for two weeks. The latter article had a lot more linkspam, which I have removed. ~Amatulić (talk) 02:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

helpinghandshomecare.co.uk


Spammers are:

Private nursing care provider. Both the above users (likely sockpuppets) are pushing the site across multiple UK artlicles mostly disguised as a reference. --Bob Re-born (talk) 15:26, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

killercop.com
As is clear from WikiProject Spam/LinkReports/killercop.com, it seems that killercop.com serves no purpose other than to violate BLP. The full list is available at WikiProject Spam/LinkReports/killercop.com. OCNative (talk) 04:02, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * This edit, edit, and edit, to Elena J. Duarte had to be redacted for violations of BLP and all included links to killercop.com. (All of these are confirmable via WikiProject Spam/LinkReports/killercop.com.)
 * This edit and this edit adding killercop.com were both reverted on Alex Kozinski.
 * There were 14 edits (!) to Howard Matz all adding killercop.com. All were reverted.

Cloud computing
This IP added at least two times that URL at Cloud computing as a reference. I was aware of it since this IP requested an account at WP:ACC, which violates UPol (with a name ending with "ad").  mabdul 10:03, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Adsense pub-9118466005375688


MER-C 11:50, 25 November 2011 (UTC)
 * --Hu12 (talk) 00:28, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Adsense pub-9926124590943879


MER-C 10:58, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅--Hu12 (talk) 00:23, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

=Proposed removals=

otakuhouse.com
I was trying to add an external link when I found out they were blacklisted. I cannot find out why when there is a whole lot of high quality information in the blog area www.otakuhouse.com/home — Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.255.2.162 (talk • contribs) 07:01, 25 October 2011
 * , due to SEO spamming. Additionaly, Blogs are Links normally to be avoided and would fail Wikipedias specific inclusion requirements of our External Links policy, Verifiability Policy and Reliable Source guidelines.--Hu12 (talk) 15:32, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Wizardistanbul.com Official Travel Guide
Blacklist Removal request: As a newbie of Wikipedia, i was just adding External links on Istanbul and travelling Istanbul related pages(like main attractions, province, towns of Istanbul, transportation in Istanbul). Wizardistanbul.com is official Istanbul travel guide supported by Ministry of Tourism. Also not like other sites, the site works like a call center and replies any questions of tourists in minutes manually.

So even it may seem spam, its worth to add external links on Istanbul related wiki pages which directs mostly tourists or info seekers to ask questions directly to the source. Also if it's possible can you please add Wizardistanbul.com to Whitelist.
 * This link is globally blacklisted. I will transfer this request to m:Talk:Spam blacklist. EdBever (talk) 18:23, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

PixelJoint.com, Pixel art community
and, if possible, I was trying to add these two as externals links on the pixel art page when I found out they were blacklisted. I've traced it back to 2008, to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3APixel_art#Suggestions_for_external_links where no specific reason was given for the blacklisting. As pixeljoint is the second google listing for 'pixel art' (first is the wikipedia article) and second and third for 'pixel art forum', I reckon it's important enough to warrant a mention on the pixel art page. Pixelation (wayofthepixel.net) is not as large because it's a more elitist forum, but it's still the first listing for 'pixel art forum'. Pixelsnader (talk) 07:53, 7 October 2011 (UTC)
 * It is a forum. Even if it were removed from the blacklist it would not be allowed within articles - see WP:ELNO. --Biker Biker (talk) 08:04, 7 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Pixeljoint is not a forum, it has a forum. The most important part of the site however, is a gallery similar to Deviantart (but obviously narrowed down to a single artform). Pixelsnader (talk) 16:47, 23 October 2011 (UTC)


 * . While those links wouldn't be allowed due to WP:ELNO, pixeljoint and wayofthepixel aren't listed here anyway. They're listed at Spam-blacklist. I doubt you will have any luck getting them delisted from there. ~Amatulić (talk) 19:59, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

www.sfidelhi.co.nr


Hi while reverting vandalism by several IP users on Students' Federation of India page I came to realize that the link is blacklisted. I manually check the link by visiting the website and it seems OK to me. However as this website is hosted on a free web-space there is a little advertising on it, but apart from them this website is the official representetive of the Students Federation of India New Delhi. Please Remove it from Blacklist. -Viplovecomm (talk) 15:56, 11 October 2011 (UTC)
 * . Not listed here. The entire *.co.nr top level domain is blacklisted globally on all Wiki projects. ~Amatulić (talk) 19:48, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

www.hibiny.ru
In the fall of 2007 user added about 20 links to this site. Because of his name we can assume he was spamming.
 * Here's the incident report: WikiProject Spam/LinkReports/hibiny.ru
 * Here's where the report was accepted.

Can't find any evidence of other problems with this site being spammed. It looks be a typical local-news (or news aggregator) site, perfectly acceptable. Don't see why it shouldn't be removed from the bad-boy list at this point.

Also, the page I want to use (http://www.XXXXX.ru/news/en/archive/14771, except replace "XXXXX" with "hibiny" -- it won't let me save my post here if I use the actual link, apparently) is in English, which is rare and useful for obscure Russian subjects. I want to use it in Hotel Arctic (Murmansk) and could you please expedite as I want to send this to DYK and the clock is ticking. (If for some reason you don't want to unblock the site can I get that page unblocked for that one article at least?) Thanks, Herostratus (talk) 06:27, 22 October 2011 (UTC)
 * The whitelist can handle BL'd links on a page-by-page basis. — Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 15:56, 22 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh, OK. And actually I realize there's no hurry, it's not critical to the article and can be be added later. But anyway, the whole site should be removed from the blacklist. It seems (without having done an exhaustive review) to be a reasonably reliable source for local events, and just because it mildly spammed once by one person some years ago is not sufficient reason to remove from the resources available to us. (There was a very similar case a few weeks ago where a person spammed the Quincy Patriot Ledger a bit, and the person was banned, but the paper was not removed from the resources available to us. I think that's right.) Herostratus (talk) 15:42, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Bueller? Bueller? Anyone? Herostratus (talk) 10:07, 1 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Eh, this is on meta .. you will have to ask for removal there. /.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 10:16, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Okey-dokey, thanks. Herostratus (talk) 17:39, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

infosecinstitute.com
This is to request to unblock the site to be used in Charlie_Miller_(security_researcher). A link in the article says resources.infosecinstitute.org but this is NXDOMAIN now. According to meta:Talk:Spam_blacklist it's not on the global spam blacklist. Please unblock. Thanks, 194.246.123.103 (talk) 04:14, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
 * . Would appear the site is nothing more than for selling training products and services. Please take a look at the specific requirements of our External Links and Reliable Sources guidelines. I don't think this link meets either guideline.--Hu12 (talk) 15:51, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't understand the WPSPAM part: it lists a non-existant article and a few disabled user accounts, all with the usual "Linksearch" and "whois" buttons. What is this supposed to mean? Maybe I don't understand the rationale about all this: sure, this site may sell training products and services. Lots of sites out there sell things. But some sites do something else besides selling and http://resources.infosecinstitute.MOC/how-charlie-miller-does-research/ does not seem like it's trying to sell me something. They have quite a few interviews there (on the right side) with somwhat notable researchers, I don't see why it should not be allowed linking to them. Please reconsider. Thanks, 194.246.123.103 (talk) 20:45, 26 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Yes, the article was created by spammers and deleted, the users were either editing said article, or spamming the site (e.g. the mentioned user Markg123 added the link in this edit, and the other visible edits of this account are all regarding the mentioned article. Mardg123 also has three deleted edits, which are all three to the deleted article.  The first IP in the list only has edits to external links sections of a large variety of articles .. all similar to this (or adding other sites, and even removing some).  Typical behaviour of spammers.  As Hu12, I don't think this should be listed, .  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 10:22, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

www.rivercanyonpress.com


Hi. I am the owner and editor of River Canyon Press. It's a small indie publisher in Oakland, Oregon. I was very surprised to see our url on the wikipedia blacklist. Our site is a information site (about our press and our publishing process) and it does have links to an external book purchasing site. In the past I think we've only linked to our site to give more information about the books mentioned. In this case, it was the first book ever published entirely using QR codes -- no words. I am pretty new at this and would love to know why we're on a list with superspammers and sexual predators... I want to contribute but I don't know what I did wrong. Thank you for your help. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rcpeditor (talk • contribs) 01:37, 31 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia is NOT a vehicle for advertising. Typically, we do not remove domains from the spam blacklist in response to site-owners' or those who were involved is spamming them. Equally Wikipedia is not a place to promote a site, Non-notable or self published books. Instead, we de-blacklist sites when trusted, high-volume editors request the use of blacklisted links because of their encyclopedic value in support of our encyclopedia pages. If such an editor asks to use your blacklisted links, I'm sure the request will be carefully considered and your links may well be removed.--Hu12 (talk) 17:19, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

nationalhighschool.com
I recently was trying to add posts to Wikipedia regarding online high school education, and noticed I could not reference our site because it was blacklisted. I am new to this so I am unsure to tell where exactly it happened or why. My guess is that our school, NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL, has been confused with the fake diploma scam school, NATION HIGH SCHOOL, which is not accredited at all. National High School is located in Atlanta, GA and fully accredited regionally by SACS, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, and recognized by CHEA, the Council for Higher Education Association. Our accreditation is equivalent to that of the public school systems, and because we give students an alternative form of education that allows students who typically do not perform well in a traditional brick and mortar setting, I would like to have our site removed from the blacklist because it is sending an incorrect message about our educational institution.

I greatly appreciate your look into this matter.

Thanks User:sstanle2 14:44, 5 November 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sstanle2 (talk • contribs)


 * . The blacklisting has nothing to do with "Nation High School". It has everything to do with past spamming abuse by a Search Engine Optimization service, evidently hired by National High School. See the evidence here.


 * You apparently have a conflict of interest here. See Conflict of interest for guidance. Generally we don't un-blacklist sites at the request of a site owner, webmaster, or anyone with a conflict of interest. If a trusted, high-volume editor deems nationalhighschool.com worthy of de-listing, we will consider the request. ~Amatulić (talk) 19:35, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

youtu.be

 * Note: this section has been partially restored from archive to relist:

This is the shortcut link to youtube.... As a whole, the domain should not be blocked. Good grief, the site is even blacklisted from posting the link onto this page for the purpose of example. Trackinfo (talk) 02:54, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * [was declined:] URL redirection sites are not to be used on Wikipedia.--Hu12 (talk) 13:44, 9 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Relist and appeal because youtu.be is not a URL redirection site within the meaning of EL because it is the same site as youtube.com which is allowed, and youtube.com offers youtu.be urls when "share" is clicked. Therefore, it is anti-editor to restrict youtu.be. Please remove it from the spam blacklist. Thank you. Dualus (talk) 04:00, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
 * How are readers supposed to know that the two sites are the same? If a link is for youtube.com, that is what the link should say. Links to youtube need to be sparingly applied (copyvios, non-encyclopedic, not reliable for references). Is there any evidence that someone seeing a great video and clicking "share" to paste it into an article is actually being impeded from adding encyclopedic content? Johnuniq (talk) 07:12, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
 * We don't try to enforce rules by making editing difficult. If there's a problem with youtube links in general, then adding them should produce a warning, or a bot should bug them about it. Yes, getting a spam error when someone inserts the link that youtube gives them when they click "share" is most certainly an impediment.  There is no way to make a mass judgement about all youtube links. There are hundreds of thousands of them and each should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis if you want to determine whether they are encyclopedic. Dualus (talk) 16:41, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Dualus, you may note that some youtube links are on the blacklist. YouTube links do get spammed, abused, etc. etc. There is no need to make life more difficult to a) blacklist the youtube link, and then b) also have to blacklist the youtu.be because that is the obvious loophole. There is no extra effort in using youtube.com vs. youtu.be (it is either youtu.be/ or youtube.com/watch?v= ). And regarding the share button - you know that that is actually extra effort over just copy-paste of the url from the top bar? And if you insist to use the share button, then please use the 'long link' checkbox to get a link that you can post here.

In short, there is no need to use the link, and it can be used to circumvent the blacklist. Moreover, this is listed cross-wiki (as are all redirect sites), so we can't de-list it here. . --Dirk Beetstra T  C 11:08, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
 * It was not obvious to me what was going on when I was trying to use a legitimate link to YouTube, and I wasted considerable time trying to figure out, to no avail, what the situation was. As far as I can tell, youtu.be is part of Youtube's site, it isn't apparent to me that it is some sort of redirect or URL shortener.  You have a responsibility to document this in a more effective way.Crypticfirefly (talk) 17:29, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
 * As the original poster: the shortcut links are what a user now gets when they click the share button on youtube.  It is the common way most people will copy the link, because it works everywhere else.  By blacklisting this, and requiring a wikipedia editor to know to change the link to "youtube.com/watch?v=" before the movie code is an unnecessary impediment you are throwing in the face of less experienced users.  Yeah, those of us who might dig deeper into wikipedia administration might figure out a solution, but note the majority of wikipedia contributions come from inexperienced users, IPs and passers by.  You can say a lot of that is junk--that is why serious editors and bots watch articles.  Its not all vandalism.  Because I do watch, I have learned many valuable things from drive-by edits; thinks I can leap off, reference and support.  And a lot of that kind of stuff can emanate from the contents of a youtu.be video--even if the video is itself is eventually rejected on copyvio grounds.  All that will be lost because the blacklist warning will tell the contributor "go away" with no recourse.  With it, all the knowledge they could be helping us add to the useful content of wikipedia. Trackinfo (talk) 19:41, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
 * It was mentioned above, but I'll restate it here a bit clearer: There are multiple blacklist levels - a local blacklist (on en.wikipedia.org), and a global cross-wiki blacklist (on meta.wikimedia.org). The url being requested is listed cross-wiki on meta, not on the English Wikipedia - so requests for removal must be made at Meta:WM:SPAM.  On the local wiki, there's no entry to be removed.  --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 20:04, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Another solution is to whitelist youtu.be here locally. I could agree on that, when it is also revertlisted on XLinkBot, and I would strongly encourage a bot to be activated that strictly rewrites youtu.be to the full link (or other common redirect sites - there are more of these), and volunteers to monitor remaining non-converted links, as they are likely blacklisted (the bot could log them somewhere). --Dirk Beetstra T C 09:29, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Note, AFAIK, these two are the first requests for removal of youtu.be in 11 months. I agree, many new editors will not know what to do and go away - but it surprises me that none of them ever came here (I would have expected then more requests or comments). --Dirk Beetstra T C 09:32, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Another note, I also have not seen it for the many other sites where we have this problem - facebook and myspace e.g. --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:42, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps. But MySpace is pretty defunct these days, and the kinds of situations where it is appropriate to link to Facebook are probably far less frequent then situations where it is appropriate to link to YouTube.  I think you, Dirk Beetstra, supported adding youtu.be to the meta wiki previously.  Could you explain how someone could use it to circumvent the blacklist?  It looks to me like it only works for videos on YouTube to begin with, you can't use it to obfuscate some other address.Crypticfirefly (talk) 06:54, 2 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Yes, I added it, as I do for practically every redirect we encounter.
 * Youtube has good stuff on there - unfortunately, some material on youtube is spam (plainly there to earn money), other videos are plain copyright violations (and unfortunately, the more interesting information on youtube (and not the plethora of videos of birthdays of family members etc.) is the more likely to be copyright violations (people recording copyrighted information from e.g. TV, and uploading it - it should be noted that increasingly youtube is now used by entities that upload their official videos, which increases the ratio 'good':'copyvio for interesting material)), some material is there to push a POV. Such material does occasionally get blacklisted.
 * When youtu.be is not blacklisted, the rules (here locally and on meta):
 * \byoutube\.com/watch\?v=(?:_cyR-XJtPN|0rjc-vh06_c|9JDLl1CMuNs|cmdkmm1ohha|eAaQNACwaLw|edikv0zbAlU|gdsUmAZFaVA)
 * \byoutube\.com/watch\?v=IrrCXlgk1TM
 * \byoutube\.com/watch\?v=khM48EQyVdc
 * \byoutube\.com/watch\?v=tqedszqxxzs\b
 * \byoutube.com\/watch\?v=XePjp-H3TBI\b
 * And those on other local Wikis can all be circumvented by using the shortcut. That would enforce blacklisters to not only blacklist the video, but for all rules also blacklist all youtube redirect sites (there are more, youtu.be is not the only one).  As opposed to vandalism, spammers and POV pushers do go that extra mile to get their material on Wikipedia (this technique is used when sites get blacklisted, spammers do sometimes attempt to use redirect sites).  That is the loophole that is open when you leave redirect sites open.
 * We could suggest to whitelist it for en.wikipedia, and have a bot rewrite such redirects when they are added on a very regular basis (as the abuse will not have a huge volume), and have it report when rewriting hits the blacklist (and find the culprit / blacklist the specific redirect). I've asked User:Anomie about this idea.
 * You are right, that it can't be used for other addresses, so the use is pretty specific - but this type of redirect sites exist for many, many sites - and if we allow youtu.be, then also those should be enabled, which inevitably will give more and more work for those maintaining the blacklists.
 * youtu.be is not the only site being blocked, the blacklists are long. It is inevitable that good faith editors will run into blacklisted sites every now and then.  Most of that stuff is blacklisted for a very good reason (editors will just occasionally run into youtu.be - I am afraid that by far most users will run into the blacklist for the real redirect sites).  That will inevitably be deemed as bitey by some, and some editors will leave because of it (unfortunately, the better solution - the AbuseFilter - will not be able to handle this, it is probably slowing down editing too much for that due to the massive regexes that are needed).  For youtu.be, some of those additions which are now blocked by the blacklist should be blocked anyway - so while it makes editing more easy and maybe friendly, it also opens up problems at the other side.  For now I would suggest to use the whitelist/bot-rewrite method locally.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 12:46, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Here's another suggestion. As you probably know, the error message generated by attempts to use the youtu.be address is as follows:
 * Your edit was not saved because it contains a new external link to a site registered on Wikipedia's blacklist.
 * To save your changes now, you must go back and remove the blocked link (shown below), and then save.
 * If you feel the link is needed, you can:
 * Request that the entire website be allowed, that is, removed from the local or global spam blacklists (check both lists to see which one is affecting you).
 * Request that just the specific page be allowed, without unblocking the whole website, by asking on the spam whitelist talk page.
 * Blacklisting indicates past problems with the link, so any requests should clearly demonstrate how inclusion would benefit Wikipedia.
 * Would it be possible to alter the text of the error message to explain the redirect situation? Perhaps the first few lines could instead read something like "Your edit was not saved because it contains a new external link to a site registered on Wikipedia's blacklist, or it is a URL that Wikipedia recognizes as a redirect or URL shortener such as tinyurl or the ones implemented by YouTube and MySpace.  To save your changes now, you must go back and remove the blocked link (shown below), and then save.  If the link is a redirect, replace it with the full URL of the page you are attempting to link."  This would have the advantage of increasing transparency for the user, and I think is less bitey because it explains what is going on.  What do you think? Crypticfirefly (talk) 03:06, 4 November 2011 (UTC)


 * That would anyway be a good thing to make that page less bitey. It can be implemented even with other solutions.  It must be somewhere in the MediaWiki-namespace.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 11:47, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It is MediaWiki:Spamprotectiontext. --Dirk Beetstra T  C 11:49, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I have added a 1-line bullet to that message to explain that you may be able to save your changes by using a non-shortened URL. ~Amatulić (talk) 20:34, 4 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I would suggest to expand, maybe collapsed:


 * Typical url-shorteners include http://bit.ly ,
 * Other, site specific url-shorteners include youtu.be (youtube.com)
 * Other, less obvious redirect services include e.g. google.com/url?


 * Not everyone knows what url-shorteners are, and when they first have to follow the links, they may loose what they were typing. --Dirk Beetstra T  C 09:22, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Google?
On our URL shortener I read "On 21 December 2009, Google also announced a service called YouTube URL Shortener, youtu.be, and since September 2010, Google URL Shortener has become available via a direct interface" .. is youtu.be part of Google, and is it used to gather Google information (and is that other than what Google would get via the direct youtube.com link?)? --Dirk Beetstra T C 08:47, 10 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Google links seem to be triggering the spam filter directly. I attempted to link to a source on an AFD discussion, and was greeted with the blacklist message that the edit was blocked because it contained the blacklisted URL: http://www.google.com/url?  I can see this causing problems. - Smerdis of Tlön - killing the human spirit since 2003! 16:04, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, Google isn't a source for anything, so there isn't any reason to use it when linking to sources. Any URL that contains the string "url" simply redirects somewhere else, and that destination URL should be used instead. ~Amatulić (talk) 17:55, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry, this discussion is about google.com/url? - my question involves youtu.be as being a part of Google, which is something else.

libertas.sm
A local news website from the Republic of San Marino (trying to add a reference to their recent census). Likely blocked because of confusion of .sm with S&M. The mayor of Yurp (talk) 00:40, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * . This site is not listed here, and it most certainly isn't blocked because of the .sm top-level domain. ~Amatulić (talk) 19:28, 10 November 2011 (UTC)