Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Ciaran.london/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



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Looks like a similar pattern of disruptive editing in articles about British political offices. The main account was blocked only recently as was another sub-account called Politicsnerd123. No Great Shaker (talk) 15:16, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

Expanded statement
Hello,. The case was raised via the Twinkle function as an alternative to ARV. I don't think Twinkle is a good way to open an SPI. I was in a hurry as the problem was current and impacting several articles. I did make a mistake yesterday because I thought it was Politicsnerd123 (PN123) who had tried to introduce the numbering of British political officeholders but in fact that was DaleYorks on 2 February – see, for example, here, here and here. There was one of these for every prime minister and they were all reverted same day by other editors, including sysops. DaleYorks vigorously protested and claimed that he is right despite the accepted convention that, unlike American officeholders, British ones are not numbered.

DaleYorks was created in May 2019 and has been something of a "sleeper" account with occasional interest in Eurovision and college articles. There had been no political activity until 2 February, only a few days after the blocks were placed on CL and PN123, who had both been reverted many times for original research and, shall we say, "innovations". To be fair, the numbering is a new one and does leave an element of doubt that DaleYorks is another CL account. However, the timing is significant. DaleYorks has not been active 2 February. I've added the account above as a second SSP.

The Iolanda1 account opened yesterday and immediately launched into a wikitable conversion effort across several British political officeholder articles: e.g., Chief Secretary to the Treasury, where has registered an interest by opposing the introduction of numbering. I find it hard to believe that any genuine new member would immediately launch themselves into a campaign of this sort involving a redesign of wikitables and even creating them. The only logical conclusion is that Iolanda1 is a sockpuppet and their behaviour, especially the level of protest, matches that of DaleYorks. The numbering edits here and here are exactly the same as DaleYorks' edits of infoboxes on the prime minister articles.

There is also a similar attitude at CL such as the "You won't dare block me" and "Not disruptive" retorts to warnings on their talk page, followed by the "I was only" pleas when found out, which are similar in expression to Iolanda's "merely adding numbering" in the edit summaries yesterday.

It is, of course, possible that Iolanda and DaleYorks are nothing to do with each other or with CL and PN123 but the subject-matter, the timings, and the modus operandi are very significant and can only be viewed with suspicion. If I am wrong, I will apologise, but there's no smoke without fire. The WP:DUCK evidence may not be fully conclusive and so I strongly recommend the checkuser. Do please let me know if you need more diffs, explanations, etc. Thank you. No Great Shaker (talk) 10:07, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that very detailed account. I'll try to find time to look into it, but I won't have a chance to do so for some time now. JBW (talk) 22:42, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

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

I am not "Ciaran.london". The only accounts I have on this website are DaleYorks and DaleUK, the latter being one I do not use. I reject the notion that I am somehow linked to any other account by User:No Great Shaker and can provide a copy of my ID to an administrator via email. DaleYorks (talk) 12:30, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * "Looks like a similar pattern of disruptive editing" is far too vague to form a basis for taking any action. You need to provide links to specific edits that show sufficient similarity. JBW (talk) 17:18, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
 * . Same country and common user agents, but different ISPs and ranges.  ~Oshwah~  (talk) (contribs)   19:49, 14 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I'm not comfortable blocking given the CU results. Ciaran would add "order" to officeholder infoboxes, but they don't seem to be known for numbering large wikitables. Sro23 (talk) 04:11, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



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See Special:Diff/1024543405 and simple:Special:Diff/7541580. &#8209;&#8209;Neveselbert (talk · contribs · email) 20:37, 22 May 2021 (UTC)

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

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * Obviously the same person. They've been using the /64 range to evade their blocked since February (shortly after the block was placed); blocked the range for six months. Girth Summit  (blether)  13:52, 23 May 2021 (UTC)