Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Srahmadi/Archive

05 March 2015

 * Suspected sockpuppets


 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

All five accounts have already been tied to each other via a CheckUser on Meta. All five accounts have been recently and simultaneously active here on English Wikipedia, sometimes editing the same pages within a few minutes of each other (e.g., and, or  and ). At least two of the accounts have also received complaints about pushing anti-Semitic POVs (see Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents and Articles for deletion/Ali Munif Ashmar) and most of them have been posting non-free text in violation of its copyright (see Contributor copyright investigations).

I think another CheckUser run is in order as I suspect there are other sockpuppets currently operating, including the following:



—Psychonaut (talk) 11:24, 5 March 2015 (UTC)


 * The User:Mahdisoldier account aroused my suspicion because it was created at about the same time as User:AliAkar and User:M.Sakhaie, and was used to edit obscure pages created by the other sockpuppets, including Mohammad Jahanara, User:AliAkar/Ali Akar Shiroodi, and User:Viator313/sandbox. I find it highly improbable that User:Mahdisoldier would just happen upon these pages, mere hours after they were created, and without any on-wiki communication between the accounts. —Psychonaut (talk) 10:15, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

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

On Commons, another account—Saeegh—was blocked as a sockpuppet of AliAkar ; an account with that same name is currently active on en.Wikipedia: —BlueMoonset (talk) 18:02, 5 March 2015 (UTC) (reformatted: 18:38, 5 March 2015 (UTC))

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * - Since there might be more socks (as there were more at Meta), I'm endorsing the CU check.  Vanjagenije  (talk)  11:47, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: I have blocked Srahmadi, Hananeh.M.h, M.Sakhaie and AliAkar, see ANI, but not tagged; perhaps somebody else would be so kind. Bishonen &#124; talk 16:13, 5 March 2015 (UTC).
 * All those that are blocked are now tagged.  Vanjagenije  (talk)  17:02, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
 * The results concur with what was discovered at meta and commons:, , , , , , and are ✅ the same. As  has been indefinitely blocked and there appears to be a consensus to keep it in place as per AN/I, the same block is applied to all accounts including two accounts with a longer history.  is ❌. - Mailer Diablo 07:37, 6 March 2015 (UTC)


 * , can you provide any evidence to show that Mahdisoldier is a sockpuppet?  Vanjagenije  (talk)  10:07, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Yes,, but that is not vary conclusive evidence. Anyway, Mahdisoldier has not edited since December, so I believe it is fair to close this now.  Vanjagenije  (talk)  18:42, 18 March 2015 (UTC)

20 March 2015

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

Charm4Fasl is a relatively new editor (first edit on 2/12/15, only 58 edits total. Yet this editor is editing at Contributor copyright investigations/Srahmadi.. CCI is a pretty obscure, technical part of the Wiki, and is an unlikely place for newcomers to land. Looking at X!'s edit counter, Char4Fasl has edited several pages where Srahmadi or sock puppets either created or made very substantial contributions. These include: Ahmad Motevaselian, List of Iranian commanders in the Iran–Iraq War, Hosein Alam-alhoda, Hamid Bakeri. Given that the subject of a CCI is not welcome to evaluate the copyright status of the articles listed in the CCI, using a sock puppet account to do so would constitute an abusive use of multiple accounts. GabrielF (talk) 14:05, 20 March 2015 (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
. I think there is sufficient evidence presented by GabrielF to justify a CU. In addition, the puppet's user page is similar to other sock user pages, and the puppet has also edited Commons and the Iranian wikipedia, among others, also similar to the master and other puppets.--Bbb23 (talk) 19:42, 28 March 2015 (UTC)
 * At best, . Elockid  ( Talk ) 15:01, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm not familiar with CCIs. I looked at the edits made by the account, and it looked to me like they found one copyright infringement and a few no's. When I clicked on the link for the yes, it seemed to be right (I think it was 91% infringement or something like that). I'm not sure how to evaluate whether the no's are supported. Can you? In addition, with respect to the account's other edits, were they inherently disruptive? Thanks.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:25, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Looking at the two articles marked as no, Sahifah of al-Ridha is difficult to evaluate because the content appears to have been substantially rewritten by User:LlywelynII. I could not find evidence of copyvio at Mahdi Zein-eddin, however, the article is written in broken English and may have been machine translated from Farsi. That article is problematic for other reasons (the cited sources appear to be hagiographies). The account has done a little edit-warring, but I would not describe the edits as disruptive enough to warrant a block for reasons other than sock puppetry.GabrielF (talk) 23:37, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the appraisal, . I'm taking no action. Closing.--Bbb23 (talk) 23:41, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Was there any reason to link my name above? Did you have some question or reason to bring me by? or was it just a formatting mistake? — Llywelyn II   14:17, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

04 April 2015

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

I think there's a link between new user User:Soltan67, User:Charm4Fasl (who CU concluded as a possible sock puppet, see above) and User:Srahmadi. Soltan67 is a new user with an editing history that overlaps Charm4Fasl. Both edited Talk:Ahmad Motevaselian (and made similar comments. Both edited Contributor copyright investigations/Srahmadi. CCI is an obscure, specialized area of the wiki, and unlikely to be discovered by a new user. Soltan67 and Charm4Fasl have three user boxes is common. My concern here is that Srahmadi is attempting to edit his own CCI page, which would be inappropriate. GabrielF (talk) 19:15, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

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

I agree with User:GabrielF's assessment. New users do not start processing CCIs on their first day. Soltan67's only edit to that page was to mark one of the alleged sockmaster's articles as non-infringing, even though the grounds for doing so were spurious. Besides this the editing interests (modern Iranian history) and writing style (generally poor English) match. CU could clinch the identification but the behavioural evidence is already strong. —Psychonaut (talk) 18:20, 5 April 2015 (UTC)
 * More behavioural evidence: like the previous accounts, this one is creating new articles consisting of non-free text plagiarized from web sources . –Psychonaut (talk) 13:00, 6 April 2015 (UTC)

Bbb23: Given the long backlog of suspected copyvios to process, it's best to presumptively delete all the sockpuppet's new article creations (or at least, those which haven't yet attracted major edits from other editors) under CSD-G5. Any articles that remain can be added to the CCI. —Psychonaut (talk) 07:24, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
 * ✅.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:58, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
. I'm working on this.--Bbb23 (talk) 20:58, 4 April 2015 (UTC)
 * is ✅ to and has been indeffed and tagged accordingly. I'm leaving the case on hold because I will have more to say on User:Charm4Fasl soonish. I decided not to wait to post this part of the CU because of the continuing disruption of the sock.  and, if there are pages you believe require deletion per G5, please let me know what they are. Thanks.--Bbb23 (talk) 01:27, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Based on the technical evidence, is in between  and  to . In my view, the behavioral evidence bumps that finding to . I'll let a clerk decide whether Charm4Fasl should be blocked. Note to clerk: There may be more findings posted about sleepers, so even after Charm4Fasl is evaluated for a possible block, please leave the case open for the time being. Feel free to ping me if it stays open too long. Thanks.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:48, 7 April 2015 (UTC)


 * In my checks, I found two more accounts:
 * is ✅
 * is ✅, but
 * ​—DoRD (talk)​ 22:38, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Indeffed and tagged Sampad55. Declining to block Homiho after behavioral review. Homiho has spent his entire time working on one article in his sandbox. I compared his efforts to pages created by Soltan67 (now deleted) and those of the master. The most obvious difference is punctuation and capitalization of sentences. The master and Soltan67 are consistent in not starting a sentence with a capital letter and punctuating often without spaces. Homiho doesn't do that and although his English isn't perfect, it's significantly better than the other two accounts. Closing.--Bbb23 (talk) 19:35, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

07 May 2015

 * Suspected sockpuppets




 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

is solely engaged in the same area as Srahmadi, i.e. promotion of Iran's Islamist rule, exhibits the same self-entitled attitude when warned about their conduct, creates large numbers of tenuous redirects, and generally speaks the same broken English. Their account was created about a week after Srahmadi's latest confirmed sock was blocked. Anders Feder (talk) 14:43, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

The symptoms are similar for. 1) His account was created two days after Srahmadi's last confirmed sock was blocked. 2) Like the sock, he has created several articles or drafts about Iranian "Holy Defense" books and films. One of the titles has created a draft for, "Journey to Heading 270 Degrees", is in fact identical to one  had created a draft for. 3) Just a month after his account was created, he somehow happened upon for an image  had added to the Ali Khamenei article. 4) In an AfD yesterday, he wrote in a reply to me: "I think you have more problem with topic!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"; it is unclear why a month-old user would assume I "have more problem with topic!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!", when all I've done on the AfD was comment about what WP:PEACOCK is. The accusation also sounds similar to one made against me on another AfD: "You have personal problem with Iran and just sentence about this country and you say your idea and this is not public idea about a country."--Anders Feder (talk) 07:15, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Additionally, this looks like a duck. Quack quack.--Anders Feder (talk) 13:49, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

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

Seems quite plausible based on behavioural evidence. I also note that Sayyed Ibn Tawus, one of the articles edited by User:Papeli44, was recently created by User:Mahdisoldier, a previously suspected sockpuppet of User:Srahmadi that has suddenly resumed activity. —Psychonaut (talk) 08:15, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * User:Mahdisoldier seems to be perfect user in writing and native user but I think that he don't know about Wikipedia rules. Therefore, I saw Sayyed Ibn Tawus article and contribute on editing and don't have any relation with this user.Papeli44 (talk) 09:55, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Hello! I am Rastegarfar.mo talking with you! Are you well? How is going every thing with you these days? I want to ask a very important question. Why you think that I am Papeli44? Do you think anyone who lives in Iran and edits about Islamic topics, are the same person as you think?!?! How can I confirm that I am another person not Papeli44?! Oh... common! It's not a logical reason to accuse others by saying sock puppet.

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * - - To compare the two with Srahmadi base on the provided evidence.  Vanjagenije   (talk)  13:38, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:21, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:21, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:21, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:21, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:21, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:21, 19 May 2015 (UTC)


 * Are they connected to Srahmadi?  Vanjagenije  (talk)  17:41, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Well, yes, they are the same as Soltan67, Sampad55, and others I can't recall off the top of my head. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 18:23, 19 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Based on 's findings I've blocked the four accounts listed above.-- Jezebel's Ponyo bons mots 17:23, 22 May 2015 (UTC)
 * I tagged them. Closing the case.  Vanjagenije  (talk)  18:22, 22 May 2015 (UTC)

08 June 2015

 * Suspected sockpuppets


 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

Like Srahamdi and his socks, this is a single-purpose account devoted to writing POV-pushing articles about topics related to the Iranian revolution. The account writes with the same broken English as Srahamdi and also copies or closely paraphrases sources (see e.g. Muhammad Reza Saeedi). Like the previous accounts, it has also created an article about the book Journey to Heading 270 Degrees. Psychonaut (talk) 15:26, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * User:Chrislk02: Safest to delete them; they tend to contain copyright infringements in the form of closely paraphrased or translated text, which can sometimes be hard to spot. —Psychonaut (talk) 18:42, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

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

I agree, and would add for all the same reasons. See also their interactions. Their first talk page interaction ever seems implausible and indicative of at least meat puppetry.--Anders Feder (talk) 15:48, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

I have been following 's edits and have been correcting them, I see here that he is probably a sock puppet. I would like to make it clear that, if and when you track my edits, I am not a sock puppet and i can independently justify and verify and edits on my behalf.Rhumidian (talk) 18:20, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * and are ✅ to . Blocked, tagged, closing.--Bbb23 (talk) 16:25, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I am going to delete the articles tagged G5 created by this user unless I get an argument/rationale for keeping them. Chris  lk02  Chris Kreider 18:24, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

08 June 2015

 * Suspected sockpuppets


 * User compare report Auto-generated every hour.
 * Editor interaction utility

All edits are to articles created by or recently edited by Srahmadi's other sockpuppets, and have inserted links to Journey to Heading 270 Degrees, an article just created by one of the sockpuppets. Psychonaut (talk) 15:30, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Comments by other users
''Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.'' All probably related: --Anders Feder (talk) 20:16, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * Three of the four IPs just added haven't edited this month and don't warrant blocking. This master is a prolific user of IPs, and he will continue to edit from them, changing them as he goes. That said, if a clerk wants to block the IPs that have more recently edited based on behavior, that's entirely within their discretion.--Bbb23 (talk) 20:28, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Given that the IPs haven't edited for about a week, I don't think a block is necessary. Mike V • Talk 01:22, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets



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

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


 * Could someone merge Sockpuppet investigations/Saff V./Archive into this then? Liz Read! Talk! 21:36, 31 July 2021 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
Filing for posterity. Based on a tip from faWiki. Saff V. is definitely a sock, Badoomtalkh is likely. CaptainEek Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 19:12, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Whomever conducts this check should email me or User:Ladsgroup (via in-wiki email) so we can share some off-wiki evidence that confirms this association. huji— TALK 21:17, 31 July 2021 (UTC)

Suspected sockpuppets
FYI: Homiho, Toluehagh school, and تیرتاوافن were also blocked as socks of Srahmadi, but these accounts aren't listed in the Shrahmadi SPI.

Ghazaalch recreates draft by Homiho (a Srahmadi sockpuppet) with numerous similarities:

User:Ghazaalch's "Global Arrogance" (2021 article /older version)

User:Homiho's "Global Arrogance" (2016 draft)


 * Both the draft and the article include quote "Global arrogance is when your culture and economic clout are so powerful and widely diffused that you know that you don't need to occupy other people to influence their lives"


 * Both give emphasis on Khamenei and Khomeini’s definition of "Global arrogance"


 * Both note "National Day of Campaign against Global arrogance"


 * Both define global arrogance from a so-called "Iranian perspective"


 * Ghazaalch's version makes a comparison with "Imperialism", saying there is a "global political propaganda against Islam"; while Homiho's version makes a comparison with "Imperialism", saying there is a "US Imperialism and international Zionism wants to destroy Islam".


 * Both quote and link Thomas Friedman


 * Ghazaalch's version says "promotes the global arrogance of self-declared Christian superiority"; Homiho's version says "display of superiority or self-importance"


 * Both say "the concept of global arrogance"


 * Ghazaalch's version says "incessant struggle between the international forces of arrogance and oppression (represented by the United States, Western powers and Israel) and the oppressed nations"; while Homiho's version says "They divide the nations to Arrogant and Oppressed. They note to US and Israel as the spearheaded of Global Arrogance."

There is also this old SPI already connecting Ghazaalch to the Srahmadi sockfarm (via Saff V., who at the time had not yet been identified as a sock of Srahmadi). Ghazaalch's block was overturned mainly per this post saying that "Ghazaalch has a better grasp on English language [than Saff V.]." But, upon closer inspection, Ghazaalch usually writes with the same grasp on English language as Saff V. (on the poorer side); yet Ghazaalch has made a few edits that are very articulate. These few articulate edits were likely written by someone else and were used to evade the last SPI (unless Ghazaalch just writes in both, poor and articulate English):


 * Ghazaalch's usual posts
 * Ghazaalch's more articulate posts

These socks have been evading detection for over a decade, so behavior may be the most substantial kind of evidence. I have sent a private email to with further evidence. ParadaJulio (talk) 09:02, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Comments by other users

 * Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.


 * The behavioural evidence in this SPI alone goes well beyond merely recreating (what you say is) a "common Iranian POV" article. ParadaJulio (talk) 08:53, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * based on the 31 July 2021 comments, I'm assuming you two might have some interest in this. -- RoySmith (talk) 13:29, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
 * @RoySmith I'm interested but we need to talk in private. What venue would work for you? Ladsgroupoverleg 14:30, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
 * - -- RoySmith (talk) 17:29, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
 * There's a lot going on here. I'm going to relist this for another CU to take a look at.  There's notes in cuwiki.
 * Note that Global Arrogance is a common Iranian POV, not that unique and with published literature. So the references to both accounts sharing this POV are fairly weak as behavioral evidence. MarioGom (talk) 15:29, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
 * CU is not going to be of assistance here unless we have something to compare to. There is no previous data on CU wiki from a cursory check. --  Amanda (she/her)  14:26, 7 May 2023 (UTC)
 * With the assistance of I was able to compare data to some that exists on CU wiki. While the country is a match, there are other factors that I can't rely on that don't match, along with the ranges being different. Also with the changes to CU recently, I don't have as much ability to make a determination here. This will require behavioral evaluation. Ladsgroup if you need a copy of the data, let me know, and I'll reply. --  Amanda (she/her)  00:32, 25 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Since this case has sat open for two months and no admin has felt comfortable making the block based on behavioral evidence, I'm going to go ahead and close it. If further evidence turns up, feel free to re-open this case. Reaper Eternal (talk) 21:51, 24 July 2023 (UTC)