Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Bolanigak/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



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Both accounts have edit warred on Concubinage in Islam in favor of each other. Mcphurphy, the article creator, returned to it after a month long break on June 25. Bolanigak showed up on June 27 and reverted to Mcphurphy's version. Bolanigak only had 17 edits before this, had been largely dormant since December 2019, and had never edited this article. Bolanigak's very first comment is similar to Mcphuphy's comment here; both describe Vice regent's edits as "cuts" and Bolangiak's comment shows that they are very familiar with the history of the dispute. Both accounts repeatedly cite the dates "7 May" and "17 May" in their justifications (Bolangiak and Mcphurphy)

It is also suspicious that the very next day (June 28), Special:Contributions/76.69.117.20 (with no prior edit history) shows up to Concubinage in Islam, reverts to Bolangiak's/Mcphurphy's version and gives the exact same reasoning as Mcphurphy and Bolanigak's above. Then on June 29, Special:Contributions/Dr_Silverstein, who had been dormant since November, suddenly shows up, reverts to Bolangiak's/Mcphurphy's version and gives the same reasoning.

Finally, McPhurphy's edits are strikingly similar to those of an account on wikiquote that was blocked for "Abusing multiple accounts" after allegations of sockpuppetry. Details of the similarities at: User:Vice regent/Temp. VR talk  15:34, 1 July 2020 (UTC)
 * given that Bolangiak only had 17 edits before showing up to the edit war, and even now only has 26 edits, it would not be hard to mask the formatting of edit summaries. The Mobile edits all date from 2019, when Mcphurphy didn't exist. Neither Bolangiak nor Mcphurphy have used mobile in 2020. Overall, I think this case is consistent with WP:SLEEPER "A sock puppet may perform a number of "good" edits to suggest it is a normal user, become dormant for some time, then awaken later." Bolangiak has done exactly that. There are some other obvious signs:
 * As mentioned above, three different accounts (including Bolanigak) appeared out of the blue to support Mcphurphy just days apart (WP:EWS, WP:IDENTICAL)
 * Concubinage in Islam is a recently created WP:OBSART with only a handful users making content related edits. Bolangiak had no WP:CONNECTION to it.
 * Mcphurphy seems WP:PRECOCIOUS, and filed an SPI case just 19 days after joining wikipedia.
 * Mcphurphy's editing seems WP:SPA in that it is almost completely dedicated to Concubinage in Islam (which he originally titled "Sexual slavery in Islam"). Edit counter shows 327/369 of Mcphurphy's mainspace edits and 262/322 of talk page edits and all 213 of userspace edits have been for that article. The only other content Mcphurphy has added is in connection to what they believe is "Sexual slavery in Islam" (Rape in Islamic law, Islam and domestic violence etc), where Mcphurphy uses the same sources to push the same narrative: that Islam allows violence against women.
 * Per, I request a checkuser to hopefully shed more light.VR talk  14:54, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.''

This is ridiculous. If I was Bolanigak why wouldn't I create the article Concubinage in Islam as Bolanigak? Keep in mind I did not know there would even be a dispute on that article when I created that article. The dispute only started weeks later. And if Bolanigak and I were the same person how come he did not come and support me in my dispute with Vice regent and his friends (SharabSalam and the IP) back in May or April ? Since Bolanigak was already an older editor they should have come and supported me in April or May if we were the same person. They are not even supporting me in my arguments against VR on Talk:Rape in Islamic law or Talk:Islam and domestic violence. Mcphurphy (talk) 22:28, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

I also have no idea who დამოკიდებუილება2 is. It seems they were copying my content. Vice regent seems to consider this in their collection of "evidence" but then argues that we are still the same person just because I only posted parts of the quotes from the Hidaya and Friedmann sources whereas დამოკიდებუილება2 posted the full quotes later. This is fallacious reasoning. I had provided the page numbers of the source where I was taking my partial quotes from. Its possible that დამოკიდებუილება2 merely looked up those page numbers to get the full quotes. The cited page of the Hidaya source is accessible online for anyone who wants to search it up on Google Books as is the Friedmann source. Mcphurphy (talk) 23:41, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

I looked through the rest of the evidence Vice regent provided. VR argues that Bolonigak's first edit was similar to mine and we both use the term "cuts" and we both cite the date of "17 May." Well, unlike who turned up to revert other editors back to Vice regent's version of the article without any prior participation on the talkpage, Bolanigak actually shared their views on the talkpage prior to reverting. Their comment indicates they went through and read the discussion and picked up my point on the date of 17th May. I had raised the point about 17 May in this section on 21 May, much before Bolanigak's comment on 27 June. So they obviously got their argument about the date from reading my earlier comment on the talkpage. The fact they read the discussion also indicates they picked up the term "cuts" from me. I suppose it is the same for the other editors.

It is inevitable that editors will pick up on each other's terms and points during discussions where they read each other's arguments and either agree or disagree. For example on 6:31 28 June I used the term "railroad" in relation to sources. Two days later, on 14:09 30 Jun, the IP 39.37.181.243 (who is on Vice regent's side of the discussion) used the same term "railroad" in relation to a source. Despite being on the opposing side, the IP picked up my phrasing. So it is no big surprise if editors who agree with me also pick up on my phrasing and arguments after reading the relevant talkpage discussions and then use those arguments in their comments and edit summaries in reverts. Unlike who had never commented on the talkpage prior to reverting back to VR's version of the article but was still somehow familiar with VR and even referred to him casually as "Vice" - which indicates familiarity. Mcphurphy (talk) 04:07, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Also relating me to is bizarre. We had disagreements with each other. Mcphurphy (talk) 06:20, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

I have no idea who დამოკიდებუილება2 is. They must have copied from my content. I have already responded to claims linking me to them here. It is too tedious to repeat all of it here so I am just giving the link to where you can read my counter-arguments. I can barely remember Balolay and Korangeutang. I also only recently learnt about Speedrailism and Sam56mas. The first people who edited that article after me were Captain Raju, Mandarax, R'n'B, Elmidae and Gjs238. Mcphurphy (talk) 11:19, 3 July 2020 (UTC)


 * This looks like a bad faith report intended to eliminate opposition in a months-long running content dispute. Here is my side of the story. I do not login regularly. I logged in a couple of times in 2018 and 2018 to make Muslim-related edits. On 22 May 2020 I made an edit on Child marriage. I was reverted by SharabSalam. Vice regent was also active on that article.. I searched up their edit histories and noticed they both converged at Talk:Concubinage in Islam. Naturally as someone who has edited Muslim-related articles the topic interested me. I read the discussion and agreed with Mcphurphy's arguments. Mcphurphy is correct that I took their points into account in my talkposts and edit summaries. I am not the only one who has agreed with Mcphurphy against Vice regent. Other longstanding editors have also done so, such as  . Another longstanding editor Eperoton also spoke against Vice regent's removal of Mcphurphy's passages. Are all these editors now connected to Mcphurphy? What about these IPs ? Are they connected to Vice regent just because they are on the same side? I don't stay long on Wikipedia when I login but have had to extend my stay this time round given this is the first time I've had a tense debate with anyone here. Bolanigak (talk) 06:22, 2 July 2020 (UTC)
 * I am a Muslim editor and I don't think there is anything anti-Islamic about Mcphurphy's edits. They are very well-sourced. Eperoton who is another editor in high standing on the Islam articles reviewed the Concubinage in Islam page and gave this assessment of Mcphurphy's presentation of the sources: "I have no reason to think that Mcphurphy hasn't reflected them in an NPOV way" 12 I am also concerned that Vice regent went admin shopping to Nick-D, an admin who was involved3 in a previous case filed by Vice's friend 4 SharabSalam and who is known to pass judgements of "anti-Islam" editing on people.
 * I am convinced by Bolanigak's explanation of how they ended up on that article and became embroiled there. I cannot even find any substance in Vice regents' argument that other users are appearing out of the blue to support Mcphurphy. Several editors who supported Mcphurphy are longstanding editors. (Vishnu Sahib: 5. Eperoton: 6) And would Vice regent apply the same argument on themself? Why are ips 7 and new accounts 8 appearing out of the blue to support Vice regent and restore their page moves and edits? Now I don't think these are Vice regent's socks, but they should apply the same good faith to others they would expect for themself. —  Hammad     (Talk!)   02:44, 3 July 2020 (UTC)


 * This is the dynamic IP here from the talkpage. While I cannot say if Vice Regent is on the mark here (think he may be off the mark on this certain claim) there is simply too much confirmed sockpuppetry to simply ignore. First there's Koreangauteng/Speedrailism/Sam56mas who was involved in linkbuilding for the article shortly after its creation   (It was called Sexual Slavery in Islam then). He's the only person to have done this and probably contributed to the upswing of the article (I myself found it like this).


 * Then there's this დამოკიდებუილება2 who was responsible for creating a parallel article on wikiquote and was very familiar with not just the article but also the conversation and points made on the talk-page which he copied without reservation (See VR's evidence). As with Koreangauteng who could not resist the temptation of chiming in briefly on a disputed issue, I do suspect that დამოკიდებუილება2 made at least some sort of edits or comments on the article or talkpage too. I should point out that while both are confirmed sock-puppets it does seem that they both are not the same as Koreangauteng's profile is Australian while დამოკიდებუილება2's is Indian.


 * Then there's Balolay too who was briefly involved in the edit war . He was invited and pinged by Mcmurphy to keep an eye over the article . A day later he was outed for sockpuppetry (on articles related to Islam and Slavery I might add ). Did he join here afterwards? I do not know but can't really help be suspicious. He was certainly interested in the topic. All of the three above are "longstanding editors" based on the definitions being used in the comments. I think the above should be investigated and the CU perhaps refiled with other accounts which to me seem more suspicious.


 * @Hammad, I would point out that I am not an IP who appeared out of the blue and the edit you show points out my past interaction. McMurphy has always been able to identify me and I have pointed this out when this is unclear (yes the dynamic IP is a headache, Vice Regent himself has told me to get an account twice by now). Also, this is not the place to discuss this but I respectfully disagree with your characterizations of McMurphy's edits as well as Eperotons characterizations of those edits. For example Eperoton also highlights concerns about the article differing from academic treatments and strongly recommends a book that argues against the general thesis of the article. You are welcome to join us on the talkpage and we can ask Eperoton to clarify his position there as well. Finally if I'm not mistaken RoySmith, the second clerk here was also involved in the previous case filed by Vice's friend and it should be noted that the results of that investigation were a positive.


 * @RoySmith you said there are three socks there but who three are you referring to? 119.152.142.79 (talk) 07:34, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * This should probably be moved to Bolanigak (upper case B). Can anybody think of any reason not to do so? -- RoySmith (talk) 02:39, 2 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Done. -- RoySmith (talk) 12:28, 2 July 2020 (UTC)
 * The reporter contacted me by email regarding what I read to be possible links to (see Sockpuppet investigations/Sam56mas), which I suspected based on a very initial pass of behavioural evidence seems likely (similar anti-Islam agenda based on what in Australia would be called "bush lawyering" Islamic texts - e.g. attempting to interpret Islamic texts and scholarly references to make anti-Islamic points, with Sam56mas socks also having created detailed anti-Islam articles like those here). I suggested that they file a SPI. I might have misread the email, but I suspect that these are yet more Sam56mas socks, noting that checkuser found in May that this person was running multiple accounts simultaneously. As a patrolling admin, I think that a checkuser would be helpful here, and this might be best merged into the Sam56mas SPI report. Nick-D (talk) 10:07, 2 July 2020 (UTC)
 * I'll leave this open for somebody else to look at, but I'm not seeing enough evidence to convince me Balanigak and Mcphurphy are socks to endorse for CU. Yes, they are interested in the same topic, and support each other's arguments.  But, I don't see enough similarity in the diffs presented (but thank you for the detailed presentation; that really helps evaluate the case).  Overall, the edit comments look very different too.  Mcphurphy is very terse ("c/e", "expand", "reply").  Bolanigak is much more verbose, plus mostly edits on mobile.  I have not investigated the Sam56mas tie-in, but I do note there's three socks there that won't go stale for another 3-4 weeks, so if this gets re-filed within that window, we'll have something for CU. -- RoySmith (talk) 12:43, 2 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Bolanigak and Mcphurphy are ❌. – bradv  🍁  23:58, 15 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Noting post-close that I agree with RoySmith's behavioral analysis - these appear to be multiple different editors jumping onto the same discussion. Since they all found the article around the same time, it's possible there is something off-wiki that caused these editors to take notice of the article, but there's nothing provable here. GeneralNotability (talk) 00:01, 16 July 2020 (UTC)