Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Shadowwarrior8/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



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The Shadowwarrior8 account is extremely suspicious in all sorts of ways, but the incredibly blatant tag-teaming with John stoney457 across multiple articles, most notably Al-Qaeda, really takes the cake. After Shadowwarrior8 reverted three times to add a lengthy POVFORK about alleged Iranian ties to al-Qaeda, he was bailed out by John stoney457, who reinstated Shadowwarrior8's edit and made a point of disparaging Mhhossein as "the pro-Iranian user" in a manner strikingly similar to Shadowwarrior8's own description: "Mhhossein is also an active pro-Iranian wiki editor constantly creating Wikipedia articles in favour of Iran. (starting whole articles titled "alleged Saudi role in 9/11 attacks as well as other pro-Iranian articles) etc." Interestingly enough, John stoney457 had previously attempted to remove a link to Alleged Saudi role in September 11 attacks (along with a huge amount of other information) from State-sponsored terrorism, calling it "a biased Iranian propaganda." More broadly, the behavioral overlap between these accounts is overwhelming and never more apparent than when they delete reliably-sourced information based ostensibly on their own theological insight; e.g., "To suggest even 1 Muslim would identify as 'Wahhabi' is hilarious!" because Shadowwarrior8 speaks for all Muslims, and "Bizarre quote, no Sufi says like this" because John stoney457 speaks for all Sufis. TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 19:21, 17 April 2021 (UTC)

LOL at the incompetence: Shadowwarrior8 forgets to log out and addresses me as John stoney457, writing "But to say I am an alt-account of Shadowwarrior is just the figment of your imagination."TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 20:06, 17 April 2021 (UTC)

As demonstrated in the diffs above, Shadowwarrior8 clearly abused his alternate account to engage in tag-team editing and to evade scrutiny, repeatedly, even after I raised the issue; he literally had one of the accounts tell me that "I thought you two guys had settled your dispute. But to say I am an alt-account ... is just the figment of your imagination" (emphasis added). His newfound suggestion that this was all just an innocent misunderstanding or even a legitimate use of alternate accounts on Wikipedia is dishonest revisionist history. While one might give him points for coming clean at the last moment when there is a checkuser hanging over his head, I wouldn't be too generous.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 07:24, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

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

That user TheTimesAreAChanging was a biased person who bullied me in his edit warring and hence I reported him for vandalism. I dont wish to defend myself alongside him there. However I shall state my case here.

Also note I made a complaint against him for vandalism here: Shadowwarrior8 (talk) 03:40, 19 April 2021 (UTC) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrator_intervention_against_vandalism#

As for his charge of Sockpuppetry against me, it is valid. I have mentioned that in my complaint against him as well. john_stoney457 is my account. I use shadowwarrior8 as an alt account to stay in wiki as anonymous and I usually don't use these accounts together. This was in line with legit reasons for alt-account as stated in Wikipedia. However, once I forgot to log off my account and made a mistake while trying to prevent their vandalism against my shadowwarrior8 account.

I violated my policy unknowingly due to forgetting to log off, here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Al-Qaeda&oldid=1018289926

In accordance with my mistake I have asked for my username to be changed to john_stoney457(alt) here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:GlobalRenameRequest/status

And I have also stated my reason for it there, in accordance with wiki guidelines for a legit alt-account

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sockpuppetry#Legitimate_uses "Alternative accounts have legitimate uses. For example, editors who contribute using their real name may wish to use a pseudonym for contributions with which they do not want their real name to be associated, or long-term users might create a new account to better understand the editing experience from a new user's perspective"

That was a mistake, I admit my fall. Both are my accounts and yet I used one account to support my another account.

Also note that I wasn't aware of these rules in Wikipedia until recently after creating 2 accounts. I was only learning slowly

User:Frood
 * — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shadowwarrior8 (talk • contribs) 06:00, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * - m:Special:GlobalRenameQueue/request/76072. Cabayi (talk) 07:09, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * John stoney457 has edited 9 pages, Al-Qaeda, Khomeinism, Muhammad abd-al-Salam Faraj, Qutbism, Ruhollah Khomeini, Sayyid Qutb, State-sponsored terrorism, Sufi–Salafi relations, & Wahhabism. There's an overlap between the two accounts on six of those articles. I can't see a plausible framing of that as an accidental infringement, or forgetting to log out on one occasion. Cabayi (talk) 07:30, 19 April 2021 (UTC)
 * blocked for just 3 days due to admission, & the sock indeffed. I'll decline the rename request, you can re-request once your block is over if you wish. Closing the report, Cabayi (talk) 07:36, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



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

I'll be brief. It's hard to imagine that any user would be foolish enough to immediately resume socking after getting off with an extraordinarily lenient three-day block for sockpuppetry, let alone at the same article that got them in trouble the first time. I sincerely hope that Shadowwarrior8 would not take such a risk and that my suspicions are unfounded, but the sudden appearance of Mrhafs22 (a sleeper account that was only recently reactivated after almost six months of inactivity) at the RfC initiated by Shadowwarrior8 regarding the Al-Qaeda article in order to bolster Shadowwarrior8's position using almost identical language and aspersions against other users is practically screaming for a checkuser. Despite scant edits, there is behavioral overlap between the Mrhafs22 account and the two accounts previously discussed in the archive (e.g., Shadowwarrior8 and John stoney457), especially on the subject of Salafism; Mrhafs22's edit summary to the effect that "correction: Majority of salafists dont follow the 4 big sunni school of thought, rather they identify as being a 'salafi' and see themselves as a movement" is strikingly similar to Shadowwarrior8's "To suggest even 1 Muslim would identify as 'Wahhabi' is hilarious!" and John stoney457's "Bizarre quote, no Sufi says like this" in that the edit summaries all constitute WP:OR ostensibly based on the user's own theological knowledge. While the evidence presented above is hardly a smoking gun, there is not a lot of trust left in this area; a check (whatever the outcome) seems to be the only way to restore it. TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 07:22, 20 April 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

 * - Mz7 (talk) 19:12, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Mrhafs22 is ❌, but I discovered that Shadowwarrior8 has been using other accounts besides John stoney457. The following accounts are ✅ to Shadowwarrior8:
 * There is article overlap between these accounts, especially on the Wahhabism article. : because it seems that Shadowwarrior8 has not been totally forthcoming about their use of multiple accounts, I am extending their block to indefinite. Closing. Mz7 (talk) 19:47, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Added tag for the master. -- RoySmith (talk) 00:20, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * There is article overlap between these accounts, especially on the Wahhabism article. : because it seems that Shadowwarrior8 has not been totally forthcoming about their use of multiple accounts, I am extending their block to indefinite. Closing. Mz7 (talk) 19:47, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Added tag for the master. -- RoySmith (talk) 00:20, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Added tag for the master. -- RoySmith (talk) 00:20, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets
This user was indeffed by for abuse of multiple account back in 2021 but received an AGF unblock  shortly after, presumably after making a mea culpa and promising to avoid socking moving forward. Unfortunately, I think they are back at it (or more likely, never stopped): the master account, Shadowwarrior8, was brought to ANI this last week for a bevy of problematic behaviours in CTOP areas relating to Sunni-Shia and terrorism topics. After getting pretty uniformly critical feedback from all respondents (that they have mostly adopted a WP:IDHT attitude towards), suddenly the above IP (with no previous edits on the project) popped up a couple of days back, defending Shadowwarrior8 (albeit only briefly) with almost identical arguments to their own. I happened to be looking at the Wiki markup of the IP's edit while contemplating a response, and noticed that it had some peculiar idiosyncrasies in its formatting that are also found in Shadowwarior's talk space edits (I'll hold on to the specifics of those quirks for WP:BEANS reasons for the moment). That was enough to pass the duck test for me, so I went to check their block log and discovered the history of socking.

Unfortunately I did not directly observe the behaviour at the articles involved in the ANI report, but rather was just a random respondent at the ANI itself, so I don't know whether there might be other socking issues at the affected articles, though given the blantantness of the (probable) socking at the ANI, I wouldn't be surprised if there are. I think a CU is in order, but either way, I thought I ought to bring this to the attention of the more experienced SPI eyes here. It has been a couple of years since they uncovered the original sock farm, but perhaps, being familiar with the topic areas involved here, and the modus operandum of this user, might be able to sniff out additional suspicious IPs or accounts. SnowRise let's rap 18:10, 30 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Oh yes, of course: I should have remembered that bit of the CU policy--of course we can't connect accounts in that way. Well, the ANI thread is now archived for lack of activity, and while I still have my suspicions, I think it's reasonable to argue that the one comment at the ANI is insufficient behavioural evidence in itself.  Unless someone spots more indicators of recent socking in the articles/talk pages in question, I expect we'll just have to hope for the best. Sn<b style="color:#99d5fe;">o</b><b style="color:#b2dffe;">w</b><b style="color:#B27EB2;">Rise</b><b style="color:#d4143a"> let's rap</b> 00:02, 2 January 2024 (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

 * . The CheckUser policy prevents checkusers from publicly connecting an account to its IPs (only an account to other accounts). This will need to be decided based on behavior only. Mz7 (talk) 19:27, 30 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Snow Rise. I was also leaning that way myself. I will go ahead and mark this case as closed without action. If there is additional evidence of sockpuppetry or improper logged-out editing in the future, please feel free to re-report. Mz7 (talk) 04:32, 2 January 2024 (UTC)