Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/ScholarM/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



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I believe that Youbat is a sockpuppet of ScholarM due to similar behavior, similar editing patterns, and the former always being there when needed by the latter. By using this illegitimate sock account, I believe that ScholarM has created the illusion of support, circumvented edit warring policy, contributed to the same discussion with both accounts, posed as an uninvolved commentator, and, most recently, evaded a one-month block per enforcement of an indefinite topic ban. For reference, I returned from a year-and-a-half Wikibreak on 24 June 2021. On 2 July 2021, User:Bbb23 made the following comment: These comments were apt because Youbat had already demonstrated relatively strong editing skills for a month-old account, implying previous experience editing. His first edits were on Abdul Qadir Gilani and included more than twenty edits in a period of three days which included full formatting for citations as well as a decent, if flawed, command of copyediting. This was Youbat's first instance of edit warring, in this case his reverting of User:Alivardi and User:Chewings72 (he was logged out for the last one). For reference, ScholarM has been editing since 2015. I asked User:Bishonen for advice on mediating my content dispute with ScholarM; a day later, Youbat posted an unsolicited rant about the superiority of ScholarM's content positions. He wasn't tagged in the discussion, and his intervention seemed weird. I asked User:Coffee about an older sock puppeteer who, as far as I can tell, is unrelated to ScholarM. It's a separate issue. About an hour later, though, Youbat showed up at User talk:Coffee ranting about me supposedly taking revenge on ScholarM…via an SPI for dormant accounts, I guess? He even brought up the content dispute at Barelvi. It was weird. When I complained to User:Johnuniq about Youbat hounding me on Coffee's talk page, Youbat responded on Johnuniq's talk page still ranting about my treatment of ScholarM. DISCLOSURE: I tagged Youbat here, so his timing wasn't weird in this case. He seemed for concerned for ScholarM's wellbeing than for my complaints about his own behavior though. Youbat's first edits were to Abdul Qadir Gilani, as mentioned above, and both ScholarM and Youbat continued editing the article. The second article which Youbat edited was Ilyas Qadri, where he and ScholarM engaged in reverting behavior without discussion in order to defend a supposed "consensus" only eight days apart. This was also in contravention of ScholarM's topic ban. The third article which Youbat edited was Draft:Gyarvee Sharif, where his edit followed ScholarM's by only a day. The fourth article which Youbat edited was Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi. Initially, he performed a revert to restore the ScholarM account's previous version of the article. The fifth page which Youbat edited was Articles for deletion/SunniPath (2nd nomination), in which he and ScholarM were two of the three people who voted 'keep.' Note that they both display difficulty with using articles in English grammar here. The sixth page which Youbat edited was Khwaja Hasan Sani Nizami. This is one of only three articles which Youbat edited yet ScholarM didn't. The seventh page which Youbat edited was Barelvi, wherein he and ScholarM engaged in the dual-account edit warring which needs no introduction by now. The eighth page which Youbat edited was Kanthapuram A.P. Aboobacker Musliyar. This is the second of the only three articles which Youbat edited yet ScholarM didn't, though he directly referred to a content dispute between ScholarM an myself in the summary. The ninth page which Youbat edited was Template talk:Barelvi in which he gave the appearance of conversing with ScholarM and I, without any introduction as if we were already familiar. The tenth page which Youbat edited was this generic edit to Islam. To my knowledge, ScholarM hasn't edited the page, making it the third which they didn't edit in tandem. The eleventh through fifteenth pages which Youbat edited were User talk:Bishonen, Talk:Barelvi, User talk:Youbat, User talk:Johnuniq, and User talk:MezzoMezzo. All of these are pages in which ScholarM and Youbat engaged in a series of tandem personal attacks on me, and the details of those are in other sections of this SPI. Double check my count, but from what I can see, as of his blocking 22 Jul 2021 Youbat has edited fifteen pages aside from his own user page, and twelve of those pages were edited in order to support the efforts of ScholarM. Very few people edited Draft:Gyarvee Sharif aside from its creator, yet Youbat deftly moved it from article space to draft space less than two weeks after creating his account. This was coupled with ScholarM's own edits on that article. Template talk:Barelvi similarly has very few comments from editors at all and is obscure. Youbat's aforementioned edits to Kanthuram A.P. Aboobacker Musliyar and Template talk:Barelvi came out of the blue, with no previous editing on those spaces or invitation to do so. Note that his edits, which included complicated formatted text for links to references, followed ScholarM's by only 36 minutes. ScholarM first reverted my edits on Barelvi on 26 June 2021, a time when the Youbat account had been dormant for four days. Youbat remained inactive until 1 July 2021 when he [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Barelvi&diff=1031468312&oldid=1031394901 reverted me on the article again. Youbat then continued editing Barelvi on 2 July, 3 July, 5 July, and 7 July in order to preserve ScholarM's illicit edits, even going to far as directly referencing ScholarM's arguments on Talk:Barelvi in spite of not actually posting on the article talk page until 11 July whereby he responded when Johnuniq threatened a block if Youbat and ScholarM continued their personal attacks on me. A brief look at the article's history shows tandem editing, for example when Youbat made minute adjustments to ScholarM's illicit, verification-failed edits.
 * Precocious edit history of Youbat
 * "You created your account and started editing on May 2, 2021. From the outset, you demonstrated knowledge far beyond that of a new editor. Have you any other accounts, either now or before this one?"
 * Excessive support for ScholarM's cause
 * Editing identical articles
 * Knowledge that obscure articles exist
 * (Lack) of connection to articles
 * Always there when needed

After the ScholarM account received its one-month block to enforce the indefinite topic ban, the Youbat account suddenly became active on Barelvi, reverting myself and Serols in order to preserve ScholarM's edits. When Youbat was blocked for 24 hours due to edit warring on 22 July, he waited almost exactly 24 hours and then made another rush of edits on 23 July; this level of activity for the account was only seen during the first three days on Abdul Qadir Gilani and is an oddly timed burst. This only happened a few times, but I feel it's very strong evidence and left it for last. Sometimes, ScholarM/Youbat lost track of which account was performing which edits. On 6 July 2021, ScholarM added the term "Qadri" to the end of the name "Ahmed Raza Khan" in Barelvi during one of his illicit edits. When Johnuniq questioned this on 12 July, Youbat responded taking responsibility for the edit, but then edited out that admission in his comments 20 minutes later. When pressed by Johnuniq, Youbat reverted ScholarM's addition of the term "Qadri" but referred to it as a 'self-revert' in both the edit summary and a subsequent talk page comment. When ScholarM was given a one month block for egregious violations of the topic ban on 22 July 2021, I mentioned the topic ban at 12:16 that day and explained that I'd remove ScholarM's old edits as a rejected violation of the topic ban. Seven minutes later, Youbat reverted my edits while claiming that he was reverting to his own version even though he hadn't edited in one week; rather, it was the ScholarM account which had made over thirty edits between 15 July and 17 July. Youbat seems to have mixed up which of the two accounts had made the most recent edits. After User:Serols began to revert Youbat's mass deletion of content, Youbat reverted back with the comment to "See the talk page" even though the Youbat account hadn't edited the talk page in roughly a week and a half; rather, it was the ScholarM account which had been arguing on the talk page all that time. MezzoMezzo (talk) 12:04, 24 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Mixing up their own edits with each other

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

 * Per private information from checkusers, these accounts are unlikely to be run by the same person. However, MezzoMezzo's information convinces me that they're connected. I have blocked Youbat indefinitely as a new editor brought to the site for the purpose of supporting ScholarM; compare WP:MEAT. Bishonen &#124; tålk 13:41, 24 July 2021 (UTC).


 * Nothing left to do here. Closing. Bbb23 (talk) 15:18, 24 July 2021 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



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

ScholarM was blocked on 8 August (for violating a topic ban from 2020) and Youbat was blocked for meatpuppetry in support of ScholarM on 24 July. ScholarM has repeatedly removed real life images of Akhtar Raza Khan, apparently in violation of their topic ban. The newly created accounts are edit warring over real life images in a similar fashion (replacing them with a symbol). TASchamparan:, MahammadSadab: , Rahil mirza9:. This may be meat and not sock, but the results are the same.  Eostrix  (&#x1F989; hoot hoot&#x1F989;) 07:19, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Added KhanQadriRazvi (not sure how I missed them) who has been doing the same:, . This is a ~100 edit account was was active for 3 months in 2020 (April-June) and then reactivated in August 2021.-- Eostrix  (&#x1F989; hoot hoot&#x1F989;) 13:09, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.'' I don't know much about the technical aspects of checker processes, but the behavioral evidence here demonstrates puppetry in a conclusive manner. Considering how ScholarM's other meat puppet User:Youbat was caught in the last investigation, I think it wouldn't be controversial to suggest that the users here coordinated their edits off-Wiki in order to push a certain quirky POV. ScholarM and Youbat both previously shared e-mail addresses and/or WhatsApp numbers with other users, and ScholarM has made multiple appeals to admins on Urdu Wikipedia for help in content disputes here in English Wikipedia, so there's a definite pattern of meat puppet behavior with this person. MezzoMezzo (talk) 14:46, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * I've blocked all four as obvious ducks. A checkuser will be helpful in finding other sleepers. --RegentsPark (comment) 13:30, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
 * - per RegentsPark, sleeper check if practical please. GeneralNotability (talk) 01:05, 19 August 2021 (UTC)
 * KhanQadriRazvi is ✅ to but technically  to ScholarM. The remaining accounts are also  to each other from a technical standpoint. I found the following account that is definitively ✅ to ScholarM: . NinjaRobotPirate already blocked the account, though. Closing without further action. Mz7 (talk) 07:01, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
 * - Pending outcome of unblock request at User talk:KhanQadriRazvi -- RoySmith (talk) 14:05, 20 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Based on the conversation at User talk:KhanQadriRazvi, I've unblocked KhanQadriRazvi (and I'll unblock QadriRazvee in a moment) and issued appropriate warnings on their talk page about being more constructive in the future. -- RoySmith (talk) 18:14, 20 August 2021 (UTC)