Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thiscrund68/Archive

Suspected sockpuppets



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Compare the walls of text by Thiscrund68 and Abir Babu on Talk:Circumcision. Similar styles include:
 * "Video evidence #" without correct wikitext
 * "And many of these circumcisions are performed by traditional local operators under no anesthetia or poor anesthetia" vs "non-medical traditional operators with non-surgical instruments, and often with no anesthesia."
 * "About the “Video 2”, the title of the above video in Youtube is “Funny Khatna 2016”. In Islam, “Khatna” means “Circumcision”. And for “UBAID UR REHMAN”, a fundamentalist Muslim, the uploader of the video, the screaming of the boy during his un-anesthesized circumcision was so funny. So he titled the video as “Funny Khatna 2016”." vs "About the “Video 1”, the title of the above video in Youtube is “Funny Khatna 2016”. In Islam, “Khatna” means “Circumcision”. And for “UBAID UR REHMAN”, a fundamentalist Muslim, the uploader of the video, the screaming of the boy during his un-anesthesized circumcision was so funny. So he titled the video as “Funny Khatna 2016”."
 * "Often in a circumcision case, we see a boy is screaming and people surrounding him are laughing. For example, in video 8 and in video 7, we see a boy is screaming loud in extreme pain during his circumcision, but everybody surrounding him is laughing and having fun with this." vs "For example, in video 4 and in video 6, we see a boy is screaming loud in extreme pain during his forced circumcision, but everybody surrounding him is laughing and having fun with this."

More walls of text can be found in their contributions. And on top of that, the newer account (Abir Babu) posted very interesting questions on multiple user's talk pages. Some of the questions question administrator action, which is a sign of past experience of being blocked. I'm not sure CheckUser is necessary as. Nihlus 01:46, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

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

As I ran into edit conflict with, I will move my comments to the comment section. Alex Shih (talk) 01:53, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

I have been suspecting this for a while too, and I think, and some other involved editors shares the same suspicion. After was blocked, their final contribution was at 08:30, 13 October 2017. The talk page access was then revoked, and the user submitted their first UTRS request, which was declined at 00:00, 16 October 2017. The account was then created at 15:54, 16 October 2017, and their very first post was nearly identical to the post (note the topic, content and "video evidence") made by Thiscrud68 on the very same talk page. Normally this is beyond coincidental, but to reinforce the behavioral evidence, I think it's necessary to look at the subsequent timeline.

then went on a rampage on talk page of different editors (see contribution history) before stopping at 17:29, 19 October 2017. then submitted another UTRS request at 04:30, 20 October 2017‎. In the meanwhile, came back to continue engaging in talks about forced circumcision from 11:24 to 15:12, and then stopped editing for a while. The first UTRS request submitted by during this time was closed at 17:30. It was followed by another request immediately at 18:58, and, coincidentally, then came back at 19:10 to clear their talk page, which included a warning message. After the second UTRS request at this time was closed at 20:00, 21 October 2017, returned at 15:08, 22 October 2017 with a 65,573 bytes post that was removed by  per WP:NOTFORUM.

I'll stop here for now, but to summarize the findings, there are significant overlaps in their timelines, and the overlap in contribution history suggests these two accounts share the similarities of Islam-based WP:SOAPBOX against forced circumcision of children. I invite the clerks to take a look at these overlaps to see if CU would be useful in this case. Alex Shih (talk) 01:51, 24 October 2017 (UTC)


 * Comments on Context - I will note a few of the behaviors of User:Abir Babu. One of the first things that this editor did was to register as a volunteer at the dispute resolution noticeboard.  They then intervened in a case to provide a judicial decision, when there are no judicial decisions at DRN, and were admonished by two more experienced editors.  They then posted a very long list of questions to multiple experienced editors and administrators, asking a number of questions, some of them reasonable, some of them stupid, and some of them loaded, about how to report administrator abuse.  I advised them to ask questions about articles at article talk pages, and to ask general questions at the Teahouse.  They never came to the Teahouse.  Their main focus, as noted, is genital procedures.  It isn't clear to me whether their primary focus is female genital mutilation (including so-called female circumcision), real male circumcision (whether on infants, boys, or men), or other male genital procedures.  They made a list of editors in their sandbox, referring to various capacities, including using the designator "child abuse" for some of them.  (Female genital mutilation really is child abuse, but that may or may not be the point.)  This list was deleted as an attack page.  They lay low for extended periods of time.  Then they removed postings of editors from talk pages, noting that they were "flawed", which is a blatant violation of talk page guidelines.  When this was reverted, they made a nonsensical report at the vandalism noticeboard.  At about this point they were blocked as a sockpuppet.  I suggest awareness that similar behavior by other user accounts may be observed in the future (unfortunately).  Robert McClenon (talk) 18:45, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

 * The behavioral evidence is compelling, and I've gone ahead and blocked Abir Babu on that basis. The stylistic and textual similarities that Nihlus and Alex Shih noted between Abir Babu and Thiscrund68's comments are indeed well beyond coincidental, and combined with the timeline that Alex Shih provided, I think the evidence is clear that these two accounts are related. Since the master account has its talk page revoked, I've also revoked talk page access for Abir Babu. Mz7 (talk) 03:48, 24 October 2017 (UTC)