Wikipedia:Abuse response/AT&T (Mmbabies)

Recent IP socks used by
Discussion The first two IPs listed are registered to Alief Independent School District, and the remainder are PPPoE registered to SBC (AT&T). All are sockpuppets of community-banned user Mmbabies. User was Indefblocked on February 12--only 15 days after joining--for adding blatantly false information or outright nonsense to articles. Suspected of being the puppetmaster of almost 40 sockpuppets, some of whom have made threats on talk pages and on actual articles. Some of the uglier examples:
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Some of his suspected socks' edit summaries are abusive and outright threatening: Despite the community ban, user’s pattern of blatant false edits to pages and threats continues. -- Gridlock Joe 00:24, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
 * What did I tell you about changing the logo, punk.
 * What did I tell you, what did I tell you! Son of a b(beep from KETH). I'll hurt you next time if you change this.
 * ...and still continues, two months later. -- Gridlock Joe 04:00, 26 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Accepted for investigation, but I'll probably only report on the most recent socks as listed at Long term abuse/Mmbabies. The IPs originally listed in the report have been removed as the activity is generally much too old. --User: (talk) 12:35, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Registry Information

 * Registered to: AT&T Yahoo! Internet Services, or subsidiaries

Initial Report
This case was accepted since this person is continuing to abuse Wikipedia through AT&T's network. The investigation will focus on the most recent IP sock puppets listed at Long term abuse/Mmbabies. Information from that LTA report as of 12:38, 6 September 2007 (UTC) appears below:

is a prolific vandal who frequently adds nonsense and outright fabrication to many articles. This behavior got him indefinitely blocked on February 12 2007. Following continued vandalism by way of dozens of anonymous IPs, he was banned by the community on March 30 2007.

Since then, he has continued his pattern of disruptive editing--sometimes on a daily and sometimes on a weekly basis. He edits primarily from AT&T's DSL network in the Houston, Texas area. As this is the largest DSL provider in Houston, at times the collateral damage from his blocked IPs leaves portions of that city unable to edit Wikipedia.

Due to his abusive edits, particularly his threats to the lives of celebrities (see below), numerous complaints were made to AT&T by both administrators and regular users. These complaints went unanswered. As a result, range blocks were put on almost 7,200 IP addresses within AT&T's Houston address space (dsl.hstntx.swbell.net), requiring all users in that range to create an account in order to edit Wikipedia. A semi-protect wall was set up on all pages relating to Houston television. However, he has since moved on to other stations across the country.

Modus operandi
He vandalizes articles by adding nonsense and random typing into articles. He makes it more difficult to enforce the community ban by using anonymous IPs to do his dirty work.

Articles

 * He mainly focuses on creating an alternate reality of his own doing when it comes to television and radio stations in the Houston area, such as claiming that Fox owned and operated station KRIV is actually owned by and carries the defunct WB network (note that the network never owned any of their affiliates), and that KHCW is a Trinity Broadcasting Network station, with TBN's KETH as the market's CW affil. KNWS-TV according to him is not an independent station, but carries The WB, CBS, ABC, and Fox, and has the Gulf Coast Weather Authority branding used by KRIV, while Univision's KXLN carries MyNetworkTV, not KTXH. This edit of the Houston TV template shows his imaginary Houston channel map.
 * Insists there is a fictional program called Maniac Mansion Babies based on the game (and the inspiration for his username) which aired on various networks since the early 80s (and that the game was created in 1981, not 1987). To bring this across, he inserts the image Image:Maniac Mansion (Commodore 64) box front cover art.jpg constantly into other articles such as Muppet Babies and Superbook.
 * Vandalizes articles about Christian television programs such as Gospel Bill and The Flying House with other images and fictional network/station affiliations.
 * Insists other network shows (such as Matt Houston) premiered and aired on relgious broadcasters, some which did not exist at the time of their original run.
 * Constant references to two specific public service announcements as television shows; the End Abuse campaign for the Family Violence Prevention Fund, and a late 80's recruitment commercial for the Marines (referred by him as the one with the lady making the sword), of which he has the script of memorized and uses in edits and edit summaries.
 * Seems to have an odd fixation on using images of food to do incorrect "math" to assert his alternate Houston TV reality.
 * Is aggresive to other editors cleaning up his vandalism; a constant edit summary seems to be stupid (bleep)-hole from KETH TV-39 (which is actually channel 14), and calling Azumanga1 a f***ing lady when his edits were reverted by that editor. Other times though, he tries to come across as an innocent party asking if there's a channel 46 in Houston (there is not).
 * Also suggested that all of the Houston television stations "live" in one apartment complex.
 * Has made death threats against Juan Gabriel, Enrique Iglesias‎, Nicole C. Mullen, Kellie Copeland-Kutz (daughter of Kenneth) and Christina Aguilera. He also has a particularly vicious desire to see Kellie Copeland dead because of a "bad rendition" of a song on Gospel Bill. Has also targeted Kenneth in some more recent edits and in the most recent strike even included Gloria and John.
 * Some bizarre edits include quotes from films, such as a quote from The Mask used in a death threat against the animated character Fievel Mousekewitz on the An American Tail talk page.
 * Occasionally has edits and summaries which suggest he is trying to come off as a Christian (for example, the lyrics for the TBN show Praise the Lord), but his behavior suggests otherwise.
 * Has also given out personal information about bus drivers in the Alief Independent School District on several pages; AISD subsequently lost IP-editing privileges to Wikipedia due to his vandalism.
 * Vandalizing the page of recently deceased KTRK-TV reporter Marvin Zindler with an image of Pokemon's Tracy Sketchit.
 * Changes the birthdate of celebrities, usually by two years, and changes the list of births on the affected dates' pages.
 * Changes the content on Catch 47, a Tampa Bay area sports cable channel, to that of the book Catch-22, and vice versa.
 * Actually revealed his password when he asked an admin to unblock him towards the beginning of April and another couple of times before then.

Editing style

 * Adds random typing to articles
 * At times makes nonsensical unblock requests (such as "Screw you hippies")
 * Appears to like to "play cat-and-mouse" with admins. Such as
 * May also make death threats against other editors, usually in edit summaries, though.

IP addresses
Although there were two IP's in the 202. range (both with the AISD), mainly his IP's are in the six to seven range. See Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets of Mmbabies.

WP:ABUSE
An abuse report was filed on April 10 and accepted for investigation on September 5.

Other notes

 * Several of the IP's used are registered to AT&T or SBC, the former name of AT&T
 * Mainly he uses proxies and IP addresses, but there has been only one account used: User:Noblestone
 * Mmbabies once reported himself to the AIV.
 * Under an IP sock, Mmbabies edited this very LTA page with "corrections", twice. Due to this, semi-protection was put on the page on September 2nd.
 * Since this LTA page was posted, he has increased his vandalism to using two or more IP's per day.
 * Once when asked "Why do you keep doing this?", answered "Because it's wrong.", which is also a paraphrase of a quote used by the character Hollywood in Two Stupid Dogs.

Recent sock puppets


(end of content from LTA report)

Abuse Summary

 * Investigated by.

The category of IP addresses suspected to have been used by this abusive editor contained 165 entries as of today, 9/6/07. My investigation will focus solely on those addresses listed above as part of the most recent abuses.

16 edits to 9 distinct pages between 23:52 9/4/07 and 04:22 9/5/07 (UTC).
 * Most are miscellaneous disruptive edits, including nonsense additions to articles and this IP's own talk page, as well as a self admission that the user behind the IP was Mmmbabies.
 * The most concerning behavior from this IP is a death threat against Gloria Estefan, posted three times in different locations: this IP's own talk page, the Gloria Estefan article, and its associated talk page.

8 edits to 6 distinct pages between 00:24 and 02:24, 9/4/07 (UTC).
 * 7 of 8 edits were disruptive, generally nonsensical additions to articles. The 8th edit was productive (adding a wikilink).

7 edits to 6 distinct pages between 02:00 and 02:11, 8/31/07 (UTC).
 * 6 of the edits were misc. disruptive edits, including 2 changes to the LTA report.
 * The concerning behavior from this IP is a possible death threat against Kellie Copeland posted at Talk:The Gospel Bill Show.

9 edits to 7 distinct pages between 20:43 and 21:19, 8/29/07 (UTC).
 * 8 edits were again misc. disruptions, including a self admission of identity.
 * The death threat against Kellie Copeland was posted again by this IP, which is an almost certain confirmation of identity as the edits are identical.

12 edits to 8 distinct pages between 17:12 and 17:41, 8/31/07 (UTC).
 * This time the user seems to be seeking another Wikipedia user,.
 * The Kellie Copeland death threat appears twice again from this IP, here and here.
 * The remainder of the edits are additional misc. nonsense.

5 edits to 5 distinct pages between 01:10 and 01:13, 9/1/07 (UTC).
 * Kellie Copeland death threat again, but otherwise just misc. disruption.

10 edits to 8 distinct pages between 18:49 and 19:19, 9/1/07 (UTC).
 * Kellie Copeland death threat posted again, here and here.

6 edits to 5 distinct pages between 02:56 and 03:02, 9/2/07 (UTC).
 * Nicole C. Mullen death threats here, here, and here.
 * Kellie Copeland death threat again here.

10 edits to 8 distinct pages between 04:22 and 04:37, 9/3/07 (UTC).
 * Kellie Copeland death threat yet again, here.

Contact Summary

 * Assigned to.


 * 1) E-mail sent to abuse AT sbcglobal.net, marked "High" priority. 04:02, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
 * 2) Automated reply received from AT&T Abuse (abuse AT sbcglobal.net) dated 9/6/07 23:12 (CDT) stating that the message was received and that there would likely be no further communication about this matter.  Marking actioned.

Auto-reply received from AT&T stating they received the complaint. --User: (talk) 21:19, 10 September 2007 (UTC)