Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Mwalla
User:Mwalla
- Mwalla (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Report date February 28 2009, 00:44 (UTC)
- Suspected sockpuppets
- Evidence submitted by The Sceptical Chymist (talk)
Similar pattern of disruptive edits on all 4 accounts and pattern of not signing comments on the other users' pages and article Talk pages. User 161.150.2.55 was blocked once for disruptive editing[1] and user Mwalla was blocked twice for personal attacks and violation of 3RR.[2] Spreading disruptive editing over several accounts allows user Mwalla to avoid scrutiny and harsher penalties.
These user accounts also have been used for contributions to the same discussion creating impression of a wider support of Mwalla's POV. For example see edit by Mwalla [3] and by 161.150.2.55 [4], and edit by Mwalla [5] and by 24.15.179.168 [6]. These user accounts have been used for multiple reverts to avoid the appearance of edit warring. For example, see deletions to duloxetine by Mwalla [7][8][9] and by 161.150.2.55 [10][11][12].
Mwalla in essense admitted that 24.15.179.168 and 161.150.2.55 are his socks by accidentally marking edits for these IPs by "Mwalla", see [13] and [14]. Originally, I presumed that Mwalla is a new editor and warned him that sock accounts are frowned upon at WP and asked Mwalla to provide links to the socks on his page.[15] Mwalla deleted my warning[16] and stopped using his 24.15.179.168 account. However, he continues to use his sockpuppet account 161.150.2.55 without disclosing that. Indeed, Mwalla is no newbie as the history of Mwalla's sockpuppets 161.150.2.55 and 161.150.2.56 goes back several years.
Additional evidence. Look for example at February 20. At 14:51 161.150.2.55 left a message on Skier_Dude page, where he continued the argument started as 161.150.2.55 earlier.[17] Then he logged in as Mwalla at 14:55 and made several edits between 14:55 and 17:12, including starting another discussion on Skier_Dude page [18]. Then he logged out and made two edits between 19:07 and 19:09 as 161.150.2.55 [19]. Then he logged in at 19:24 [20] to leave a couple of messages under Mwalla's name. Then again he logged out at 21:04 to continue the discussion as 161.150.2.55 at WP:MED [21]. This logging in and out is not accidental. You can see that every edit on February 20 by Mwalla is signed by four tildes while none of the edits by 161.150.2.55 is signed. Mwalla and 161.150.2.55 consistently participated in separate discussions, for example on Skier_Dude page. At the same time, these discussions were on the same topic. That means that the sockpuppeteer consciously tried to maintain separate identities and used them to create pressure on an admin (Skier_Dude) to unprotect a paroxetine page. This also means that Mwalla does not have a legitimate excuse of maintaining two separate identities to edit in two different areas.
Furthermore, Mwalla did not provide links to his IP accounts when I asked him to do that[22]. This indicates that he was not acting in good faith.The Sceptical Chymist (talk) 01:20, 3 March 2009 (UTC)
I added another IP for Mwalla (67.133.55.18). The same pattern of edits to the same articles, for example, paroxetine. The same address via whois - Downers Grove,IL. And now he is stalking another article I am editing with nonsensical changes and reverts, see [23] with edit summary "rv vandalism". Please note that this case is 3 weeks old. I appreciate that there is a backlog of SPI cases, but, perhaps, it is on the top of that backlog by now. The Sceptical Chymist (talk) 01:15, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
- Comments by accused parties See Defending yourself against claims.
- Comments by other users
- Clerk, patrolling admin and checkuser comments
- 24.15.179.168 is a residential address in Downers Grove, Illinois and the two 161.*.*.* accounts are both registered to the National City Corporation bank, which (checking their wikipedia article) have branches in Illinois. Looks like a bank worker going between home and work to me. Foxy Loxy Pounce! 10:34, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
Additional information needed it appears pretty clear that the IPs are consistent with the account. However, editing whilst logged out is not necessarily contrary to WP:SOCK. It can happen accidentally, and even extensive carelesness in this area isn't proscribed. If we are to consider this as abusive sockpuppetry, we need a clear timeline, which shows a pattern of deliberately logging out to make an edit. Mayalld (talk) 12:32, 2 March 2009 (UTC)
In progress I am reviewing the sequence of edits outlined by The Sceptical Chymist above. Mayalld (talk) 08:59, 3 March 2009 (UTC)- In progress I am slightly concerned about a failure to assume good faith here. As I said, editing as an IP is not against the rules, still less when there is no deliverate intent, and the warning was rather WP:BITEy. Deletion of warnings is permitted, and should be taken as acknowlegment that the warning has been seen, so I see no need to make any more of it. If we look at the edits that you listed for 20th February, from the account and a work IP address, and translate to local time (UTC-6), the timeline is as follows;
- 08:51 - IP edit
- 08:55 - Account edit
- 10:52 - Account edit
- 11:07 - Account edit
- 11:12 - Account edit
- 13:07 - IP edit
- 13:09 - IP edit
- 13:24 - Account edit
- 14:18 - Account edit
- 15:04 - IP edit
- In the spirit of WP:AGF, we must now ask ourselves whether there is an innocent explanation of this edit pattern.
- The first edit of the day at 08:51 is innocent enough, and can be easily explained as forgetting to log in.
- The series of logged in edits in the morning is fine.
- A pair of logged out edits in the early afternoon is slightly more problematic, although we know that this user is editing from work, and we might surmise that he is obliged to log out (rather than simply lock) when going to lunch.
- Two afternoon logged in edits are, again, fine.
- The edit at 15:04 is more problematic. There seems no obvious reason for logging out, and I would like to hear from Mwalla on this point. Mayalld (talk) 09:32, 3 March 2009 (UTC)
Clerk note: Mwalla has not taken up my invitation to comment on logged in/logged out edit patterns. In the absence of explanation, it is difficult to assume good faith on the 15:04 edit from the list above. Mayalld (talk) 14:10, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
- I will let you draw your own conclusions on the issues raised by The Sceptical Chymist. He has a POV and does not assume good faith. He has consistently harrassed me. Wikipedia is a big place, but he chooses to follow me around. When he has a disagreement with an established editor such as Orangemarlin[24], he does not try to compromise and instead tries to get them blocked [[25]] he also recruits other editors to opine on his behalf. I suspect these other editors are in fact his sock puppets.
- Conclusions
