Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Dciccolella/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



 * Tools: Editor interaction utility • Interaction Timeline • User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

Obvious company COI.

This account is almost seven years old but dormant, new account made with a blatant company-specific username. Rather than follow the prompts for how to address the situation, user used this older account to make the same edits, which aggrandized the company ignoring the warnings and reasoning in edit summaries.

Note this edit and this one are basically identical. . JesseRafe (talk) 13:46, 25 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Redacted comment was a person with a similar name to the username works for that company -- I don't see how this is doxxing if it's self-evident or should be redacted if it's pertinent to a determining a COI. JesseRafe (talk) 17:19, 25 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I really don't see how you think this is inadvertent... They made a company-name based one, got told they couldn't do so with that username then remembered that they had a personal one they made six years ago and haven't logged into since and then made similar edits using that account. The pertinent spans of 6.5 years and then two weeks does not sound inadvertent at all, and those I still think it's a sock not a more innocent meat puppet. JesseRafe (talk) 17:23, 25 June 2019 (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

 * - Looks more like inadvertent co-workers working on the same article, and I don't think CU would be useful beyond that. Declining CU so a clerk can decide what to do behaviourally. TonyBallioni (talk) 17:19, 25 June 2019 (UTC)
 * JesseRafe, you attempted to connect an account to a real person based on off-wiki evidence on-wiki. We don't allow that. This case isn't particularly prolific either, so emailing it privately wouldn't really impact any decision I would make here. These both look connected based on the on-wiki evidence. Your explanation of what happened would make me inclined to take no action since they made the call not to use a UPOL violating account. The question is if there's an intentional policy violation and how to deal with that. A clerk can decide how to best handle those questions, and CheckUser is not needed. (cc: since declined cases tend to get less attention and this one isn't a stale IP one) TonyBallioni (talk) 17:26, 25 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Using multiple accounts so as to avoid violating the username policy is a legitimate use so long as it's not to deceive, and I see no evidence of that here. Sir Sputnik (talk) 22:00, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



 * Tools: Editor interaction utility • Interaction Timeline • User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

Previous reported SPI was not fully pursued, but this three new (or suddenly resurrected after long dormancy) accounts all made roughly equivalent edits Even if this just another acceptable duck as for some reason was the case the last time, it is then even a more stronger argument than previously that they are an employee of the subject of the article and most disclose their COI and use the talk page to request edits. It still seems unclear why this was brushed aside previously. JesseRafe (talk) 14:52, 28 June 2019 (UTC)
 * "updated company logo" - June 10 by SelectMar, not blocked depsite obvious company name COI
 * "Logo was changed in 2019" - June 24 by Dciccolella, which seemed to be a duck, though also an undisclosed COI as user seems to work for the company. No warnings were given to either account as a result of the now-closed previous SPI.
 * "Updated Selective Insurance Logo" - June 28 by RenC72094, new account's very first edit. An incredible coincidence.
 * I was under the impression that Selective Insurance was a subsidiary of Marsh or another Marsh & McLennan Agency, but the companies are just intermingled, selling policies under each other's names where one is the broker and the other is the policy holder, but they are still related. Either way, the Marsh component is not the dispositive aspect of the name being problematic. More to the point, must this new account not disclose their COI, regardless of how many new accounts they create? JesseRafe (talk) 17:04, 28 June 2019 (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

 * Cabayi (talk) 16:15, 28 June 2019 (UTC)


 * , How is SelectMar a username violation. Your edit summary says "SelectMar" is an obviously unacceptable COI username for "Selective Marsh" but the company name is Selective Insurance. Does SelectMar have any meaning beyond the quite legitimate possibility of someone called Marsh who works at Selective? If it does, then this is not the place to report it, WP:UAA is the page you want. The name has overtones of WP:COI, but COI is not UAA or SPI.
 * SelectMar hasn't edited since your last report and, as your first caution to them states, they were quite at liberty to create a new account, which is what they appear to have done with.
 * The fact that edited since you filed your previous report is the only thing which could possibly be considered a breach of the rules, but even that happened before  closed the case. On that basis I'm inclined to close the case unless Sir Sputnik did not see Dciccolella's new contributions while the case was in its final stages and wants to take it further. Sir? Cabayi (talk) 16:38, 28 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The fact that edited since you filed your previous report is the only thing which could possibly be considered a breach of the rules, but even that happened before  closed the case. On that basis I'm inclined to close the case unless Sir Sputnik did not see Dciccolella's new contributions while the case was in its final stages and wants to take it further. Sir? Cabayi (talk) 16:38, 28 June 2019 (UTC)


 * , Yes, they should declare their COI, but you haven't told them that on your edit to User talk:RenC72094, you've just accused them of being a sock puppet. WP:SPI is not WP:COIN. Cabayi (talk) 17:16, 28 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm going to have to disagree with you here. If this is one person, it's no longer a simple matter of WP:UPOL compliance. They wouldn't need a third account to do that. With concerns of COI editing across multiple accounts, sockpuppetry is a distinct possibility here. As to whether this actually is one person, I'll leave that evaluation to you, per the Clerk At Work template above. Sir Sputnik (talk) 16:04, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

— Berean Hunter   (talk)  19:03, 29 June 2019 (UTC)
 * - Please confirm. Cabayi (talk) 18:23, 29 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Dciccolella is ✅ to SelectMar. RenC72094 is using a different device but in close vicinity to the others. Sock or meat is possible.
 * Since is not willing to "process the entire case", I decided to block the master for 7 days and SelectMar indeffinitelly. I left RenC72094  unblocked, as it is hard to make any conclusion based on one edit they made. Case closed.  Vanjagenije   (talk)  09:44, 20 July 2019 (UTC)