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Xebulon

19 May 2011
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Suspected sockpuppets

Please list evidence below this line. Remember to sign at the end of your section with 4 tilde characters "~~~~"

rv possible sock. Smells like banned user Xebulon NovaSkola (talk) 11:59, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Here is additional information with diffs. User Xebulon (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), had engaged in continuing vandalism on the article Culture of Nagorno-Karabakh and he was at last blocked by administrators. He then sockpuppeted and was found sock here as User Sarmatai (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). It’s clear that it is the same user or his duck making only reverts and not really any serious contributions. Please check. NovaSkola (talk) 15:12, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
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Xebulon and Sarmatai are   Confirmed; Hasanjalal is   Likely. –MuZemike 17:37, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

06 June 2011
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Suspected sockpuppets


Please list evidence below this line. Remember to sign at the end of your section with 4 tilde characters "~~~~"

User account Bahtibek (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) was created after the latest sock of Xebulon called HasanJalal was blocked and his first edits include reverting to HasanJalal/Xebulon version with removal of POV tags set by discussions on the talk page. Vandorenfm (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) who has previously reverted to the same version by removing POV tag is then back on this page to cover up Bahtibek's new account and edits on this page. Either both are Xebulon socks or are ducks quaking the same thing. Vandorenfm could also be a puppet of Aram-van (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) with same behavior participating only in reports and reverts, very clearly, for those purposes only. Please check both. NovaSkola (talk) 18:55, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
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  Checkuser note: User:Bahtibek is   Confirmed as User:Xebulon. User:Vandorenfm appears   Unrelated to both Xebulon and User:Aram-van.  Frank  |  talk  16:52, 7 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
08 August 2011
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Suspected sockpuppets

I am reporting the user names above because their activity is very suspicious and I will explain. Firstly, look at recent block of Bars77 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). It is the account that was created by Xebulon (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) to come back to Wikipedia after he was blocked and after his sockpuppet user names were also blocked. So when Bars77 was blocked because it was discovered in Sock Investigations that he is Xebulon, I reverted his and his friends POV here [1] because from June they were inserting POV alltogether and because Xebulon knew that his Bars77 user name will be discovered soon, that's why he and his 2 friends (who are registered to do only this kind of edits) were in hurry to leave more POV as much as possible before administrators catched them. I reverted and they came to his defence, first here [2] to protect sock Bars77, and then here by reporting me [3]. Please take into consideration that this report is not for retaliative action. This is to show how three accounts edited as socks and were acting as ducks as per WP:DUCK.  

It's enough to look at contributions history of Nagorno-Karabakh to see how these accounts made alternation of their actions and inserted the same POV in support of each other [4].  

Look at history of contribution by Gorzaim who made no contribution to new articles (except his own creation of his own user page) and how he was used to insert POV and do actions in support of other user names in Caucasian Albania and Nagorno Karabakh. Do you see other good, healthy, good faith edits of this user?  

Look at history of contribution of Vandorenfm who created account and then his first edits were protection of User:MarshallBagramyan [5] and then the time from that date he was only doing edits in Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement page and now Nagorno-Karabakh page ducking for Bars77 (proved sock) and Gorzaim who is also in the beginning.  

It is very suspicious that these names don't edit and then come make edits together with new accounts. The same history is with Vidovler who only did contributions on certain pages (no other good faith creation of article or other activity, just support of edit wars) and was blocked once by HelloAnnyoung. He then stoped editing, maybe because he was sock of blocked user name. Look at how MarshallBagramyan is protecting him also [6]. Also, take into consideration how MarshallBagramyan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) slowed his activity when these trio were acting. I am also bringing to your attention that MarshallBagramyan already is known as sockpuppet master. Look at one of his sockpuppets User:The Diamond Apex.  

Please look at these user names, because it is very clear there is off Wikipedia coordination and that they act susupiciously. Dighapet (talk) 14:00, 8 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Additional answer

It's not fishing trip. The user names that I showed are related because they are not active and become active only when one of them becomes active. Please look at their contributions of each one. Everybody thought Bars77 was a new editor but it was discovered it is Xebulon. These user names are created to come, enter much POV before they are catched by administrators.

 

User:Bars77 (sock of Xebulon) registers on 22 June ([7]), then starts massive POV editing on Nagorno-Karabakh page on June 28, makes 7 edits, and then all of sudden User:Vandorenfm comes on July 2 after long absence from 5 June, then on the same day Bars comes and makes 19 edits until 12 July, Vandorenfm continues on 13 July, makes 11 edits. Then, User:Parishan NPOV-s the article from their edits on 14 July ([8]) making it neutral, but Bars77 comes and reverts to Vandorenfm ([9]) on the same day. Then Vandorenfm goes again with 4 edits and when User:Ehud Lesar reverts POV except good faith input ([10]), Bars77 reverts him back to Vandorenfm ([11]) and then makes 16 edits ([12]) especially trying to insert POV and delete reference that Nagorno-Karabakh is not internationally recognized territory of Azerbaijan. When I make this edit ([13]) and explain it on the talk page (here [14]) revealing tricks of Bars77 who inputed false text which the source does not even state. Then on 19 July  he reverts me again to his version and deletes reference to Kingdom of Aghvank changing it to "region's earliest monarchs" trying to delete reference and hide the fact that Karabakh had Albanian rules not Armenian. ([15] in this diff I skipped my intermediate revert to show how much of his own text he changed). On the same day, on 19 July Gorzaim who did not edit from 17 June, comes right to this page where massive editing by his friends is taking place.

 

I am not going to show all diffs here because it will take 5 pages, but looking on history of Nagorno-Karabakh page (look here [16]) since end of June, you will see that it was edited with POV by mainly three users who are Bars77, Vandorenfm and Gorzaim who were alternating each other, which means one made several edits, then another one came and made several more POV edits and if for example Vandorenfm was reverted, Bars77 was reverting back to his version. It's very clear that Bars77 was of lower importance because he was pushed to make reverts because if he was reported he would be found as sock because he was editing from same IP as Xebulon. The other two users were ducking from different IPs from Xebulon but are clearly someone else's alternative accounts.

 

The picture is clear when you just looks at page of their contributions, how they registered and what kind of edits they made and how they were silent but came to massively edit and support each other when one of them came to insert POV.

I mentioned MarshallBagramyan, because one of first edits of Vandorenfm's was support of MarshallBagramyan in the Enforcement page [17]. How would a new user know who MarshallBagramian is if there are no connection with Marshall which is invisible to readers like you and me? I also mentioned User:Vidolver because it's a similar user name with the same type of history of contributions [18]. He was blocked ([19]) and then disappeared again. Maybe he was even User:Meowy.

When you have so many sockpuppet masters like Meowy, Hetoum I, [Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Aram-van Aram-van], Andranikpasha, who keep being discovered sockpuppets often, how can new suspicious users be ignored? Dighapet (talk) 13:37, 9 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]


Look how Vandorenfm is making comments when administrator from Enforcement page says he is the user who is mistreating Wikipedia and asks to put sanctions on him [20]. You know why Vandorenfm? Because you clearly show your purpose in Wikipedia. Dighapet (talk) 18:24, 9 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Suddenly all the users which were reported became inactive :) Dighapet (talk) 12:57, 10 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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*yawn* seems like another boring family fishing trip...--Marshal Bagramyan (talk) 04:10, 9 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am disturbed and annoyed by this frivolous and baseless SPI request by User:Dighapet who is misusing SPI as a tool to enforce his position in an edit war. User:Dighapet provided no evidence of sockpuppetry whatsoever even after he was explicitly asked to furnish new evidence. I agree with Marshal Bagramyan and the SPI administrator that this is a bad-faith "fishing trip" but believe that User:Dighapet shall be held accountable for misusing SPIs. Vandorenfm (talk) 17:30, 9 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
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30 September 2011
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Suspected sockpuppets


The accounts of Ali55te and Szeget appear to duck like Xebulon's recent sock Vandorenfm (talk · contribs) and its supportive account Gorzaim (talk · contribs) who edited interchangeably and frequently in the Nagorno-Karabakh article. The recent Nagorno-Karabakh's history shows similar edits in turns: first Ali55te, then Szeget, then Ali55te again and so on. Both accounts appeared in the Nagorno-Karabakh after Vandorenfm and Gorzaim were blocked. Of note is the fact that nearly all Szeget's contributions except most recent in Nagorno-Karabakh are minor, although not marked as such (which may suggest edit-collecting to achieve auto-confirmed status and/or imitation of uninvolved user). Ehud (talk) 00:52, 30 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

PS. I think the sockmaster could be Hetoum I (talk · contribs) or Aram-van (talk · contribs) as well, but two previous Nagorno-Karabakh socks (Vandorenfm and Bars77 ) were found to be Xebulon. While I don't exclude the possibility that Xebulon in turn is someone's else sock, I'm 99,99% sure that Ali55te and Szeget are operated by one person. Ehud (talk) 02:21, 30 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Xebulon will never stop socking, just like Hetoum I, Meowy, Andranikpasha. Is there a way to block the IP from editing and account creation?
Ali55te is obviously a meatpuppet if not a sock. He certainly ducks for those who are blocked and/or editing the page at the time. Tuscumbia (talk) 13:47, 30 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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Szeget (talk · contribs) is   Confirmed as being controlled by Xebulon (talk · contribs). Ali55te (talk · contribs) is almost certainly   Unrelated. J.delanoygabsadds 04:04, 30 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

5 September 2011
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Suspected sockpuppets


This account came up in the Iaaasi case, but I don't think it's them. Based on behavior, though, I have a feeling this is Xebulon. CU, Szeget (talk · contribs) should be usable for a check. — HelloAnnyong (say whaaat?!) 03:36, 5 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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05 January 2012
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Suspected sockpuppets


Per the closing comments of an AE case I am submitting this request. My contributions there include many pieces of evidence that can be seen in the diff page, but to summarize the case here:

  • User:Oxi42, a confirmed sock of User:Xebulon, was blocked on November 15th of 2011. Four days later the Winterbliss account was registered. Oxi42 was the most recent sock of Xebulon to be found and blocked.
  • User:Vandorenfm, another confirmed sock of Xebulon, was blocked two months before that.
  • Winterbliss has made edits in the same articles as Xebulon and Vandorenfm as well as User:Bars77 and User:Sarmatai, two more socks of Xebulon. Several of these edits by the various accounts demonstrate a shared editing history on monasteries in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.
  • Winterbliss filed an SPI case against User:Verman1, an editor Sarmatai had criticized during that account's very brief time editing. The case also listed User:Twilight Chill/User:Brandmeister as a sock of Verman1 without providing any supporting evidence. Twilight Chill/BrandMeister had previously filed an AE request against Vandorenfm. I can find no indication that the Winterbliss account had any interaction with either user until filing that SPI.
  • User:Brindz is said by Winter to have been his account on the Russian wiki before he moved to the United States in defending his familiarity with Wikipedia processes. It is a stale account with no contributions for nearly two years, which predates the creation of the Xebulon account, and it appears to have no record of being involved with Wikipedia processes there either. Similarly there is no evidence I can find of that account having an interaction with the editors listed on the SPI. The Devil's Advocate (talk) 19:34, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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Comment by Winterbliss: A comedy of errors
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If there is a need to run a checkuser please go ahead and do that. But please do not make preposterous claims like the line about "Tuscumbia obsession," which intends to show that Winterbliss and "Xebulon" supposedly both reported Tuscumbia. This is laughable nonsense, and the opposite is true. If you more carefully examine the records, it was Tuscumbia who reported Xebulon a year ago, not the other way around, and I reported Tuscumbia this year. It is very clear why Xebulon was reported by Tuscumbia - Tuscumbia seemed to report every single account to SPI whose edits he did not like. Tuscumbia reports everyone. Just count whom he reported in the last year. This is a well rehearsed yet paranoid method of destroying new entrants to WP, by falsely accusing them in being sockpuppets, and is well summarized by an independent editor Lothar von Richthofen who commented on Tuscumbia's misuse of SPIs: "Checkuser is not for fishing. If you can present actual evidence other than "they make edits that I don't like and it makes me mad so I want to harass them with SPIs on the offhand chance that they will turn up to be the same people, then maybe a new Checkuser might be in order. Otherwise, your invocation of phantom sockpuppeteers is borderline disruptive.→ [21]. Winterbliss (talk) 04:41, 8 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
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Unless I am missing them, I believe all of the accounts that could be used in a comparison check are   Stale. TNXMan 20:04, 5 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Tuscumbia obsession for admin action by Xebulon:
  • (del/undel) 21:22, January 12, 2011 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring ‎ (→User:Xebulon reported by User:Tuscumbia (Result: ))
  • (del/undel) 21:20, January 12, 2011 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring ‎ (→User:Xebulon reported by User:Tuscumbia (Result: ))
  • (del/undel) 21:19, January 12, 2011 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring ‎ (→User:Xebulon reported by User:Tuscumbia (Result: ))
  • (del/undel) 20:37, January 12, 2011 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring ‎ (→User:Xebulon reported by User:Tuscumbia (Result: ))
  • (del/undel) 21:58, January 17, 2011 (diff | hist) Caucasian Albania ‎ (Tuscumbia is back to his edit warring practice. Groundless yelling "C.Albania is part of Azerbaijani heritage is not doing anyone any good." Any proof of this claim? It was ridiculed everywhere.)
  • (del/undel) 17:10, December 30, 2010 (diff | hist) List of Armenian churches in Nakhchivan ‎ (Undid revision 405028548 by Tuscumbia (talk) propose changes on discussion pages first)
  • Tuscumbia obsession for admin action by Winterbliss:
  • (del/undel) 23:39, January 2, 2012 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement ‎ (→Result concerning Tuscumbia)
  • (del/undel) 23:37, January 2, 2012 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement ‎ (→Result concerning Tuscumbia)
  • (del/undel) 23:33, January 2, 2012 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement ‎ (→Result concerning Tuscumbia)
  • (del/undel) 23:32, January 2, 2012 (diff | hist) Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement ‎ (→Result concerning Tuscumbia)
-- DQ (t) (e) 03:48, 8 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
10 January 2012
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Suspected sockpuppets

This overlaps with the above case on User:Winterbliss as both accounts have been active at the same time. To lay out the points of evidence:

  • User:Hasanjalal, a confirmed sock of Xebulon, was blocked on May 23, 2011. Two days later the Spurlin account was registered, just like in the case above with Winterbliss.
  • User:Oxi42, a confirmed sock of Xebulon as well as a possible match to Winterbliss according to the above case, and Spurlin made overlapping edits on the Murovdag article.
  • In the AE case mentioned above in the SPI about Winterbliss, George Spurlin was mentioned and weighed in on several occasions.
  • As mentioned with Winterbliss, User:Sarmatai, a confirmed Xebulon sock, with a record of only three edits used one of them to criticize Verman1. One relevant occurrence is where, within a minute the Winterbliss and Spurlin accounts make edits related to Verman1. While editing at the same time only the Winterbliss account keeps editing in the following minutes, meaning this may have been a case of quickly logging out of one account and into another.
  • Looking over the edit history suggests another possible connection with Winterbliss over Verman1. The SPI case against Verman1 was odd since Winterbliss had no interaction with the editor. However, George Spurlin did. This revert on the Agdam Mosque article was reverted by Verman1 and eight hours later the SPI is filed against Verman1 by Winterbliss.
  • Save for the one point when Winter and Spurlin edited within the same minute there is no obvious indication of the accounts being on at the same time based on their contributions. By the same token, large gaps in Spurlin's edit history since May 25, 2011 are filled in by various Xebulon socks.

Given the case above, checking Spurlin against Oxi42 and Winterbliss might be able to positively link both Spurlin and Winter to Xebulon. The Devil's Advocate (talk) 21:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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I have no objections for the check. Don't know who the above mentioned accounts are and hopefully the baseless accusations will stop after this. --George Spurlin (talk) 01:08, 11 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
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  • It's   Unlikely that those accounts are controlled by the same person. Also, The Devil's Advocate, your evidence just barely justified a check, and I'm a little worried to see you use a carefully edged "possible" in a previous result as evidence. I think it'd be better for everyone if you had more robust evidence before coming to SPI; even a negative result tends to result in frayed tempers and ill feelings. — Coren (talk) 23:10, 11 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    •   Clerk note: Just as above, I'm having a hard time with the evidence, so I'm going to close this with no action taken. I'd also like to point out that even after the CUs were completed, this case sat untouched for four days, which leads me to believe that none of the other clerks are all that keen to take any action, either. — HelloAnnyong (say whaaat?!) 15:36, 15 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]
08 February 2012
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Suspected sockpuppets


This is my first time in a long time doing this, so I apologize if I mess up.

The issue we have is at Nagorno-Karabakh.

Here are the historical facts. These should not be in dispute:

  • In July, August, and September 2011, the article was gradually added to, bringing it from a size of ~61k to ~95k.[22]
  • On September 29 and 30, Ehud Lesar (talk · contribs) reverted it back to a 61k version.[23][24][25]
  • On October 10, Tuscumbia (talk · contribs) did the same. This one stayed.[26]
  • The stated reasoning for the above reversions was that the edits had been performed by sockpuppets of Xebulon.
  • Oliveriki had made the last edit to the larger version before Tuscumbia reverted.[27]

That brings us to two weeks ago.

  • January 24: Oliveriki reverts to his last version from October 10. A diff shows the two versions to be identical.[28] His edit summary for this is "rest references", which not only makes no sense, but in no way indicates the nature of the edit.
  • Oliveriki has not edited since.
  • After some edit warring with Zimmarod (talk · contribs) defending Oliveriki's version, and Tuscumbia's opposing it, I protected the page on Tuscumbia's version.
  • No discussion occurred over the nature of the edit, just over the nature of the editors. To this day, I do not know if the edit was valid, and I do not care to find out.
  • Protection expired on February 1.
  • At 18:00 February 7, Zimmarod reverted to Oliveriki's version, plus a couple of intervening edits, citing Tuscumbia's ban as a reason, since you can remove banned users' edits whether they are good or bad.[29]
  • However, while Tuscumbia is topic banned for six months, this is not a formal community ban or block, and I feel it doesn't apply. Furthermore, Zimmarod's edit restored a version... by banned users. The two cancel each other out and render his edit comment reeking of poor faith.
  • At 18:28, Brandmeister (talk · contribs) reverted Zimmarod.[30]
  • At 19:59, Hablabar reverted Brandmeister.[31] The edit summary is, "before revert discuss on top pages". Considering I'd given everyone involved a week to do just that and they did not, this edit summary is frankly insulting in its bad faith. The amount of discussion that had taken place could not possibly involve the entire 24k block. (If I have missed more substantive discussion, I apologize, but I don't think I have)
  • I note that this was Hablabar's first edit to Nagorno-Karabakh, betraying a likely familiarity with the article through another account.
  • At 21:25, Brandmeister reverted Hablabar.[32]
  • At 22:23, Winterbliss (talk · contribs) reverted Brandmeister.[33] The edit summary was "see talk pp." See above for what I think of this summary.

I want to make it clear that I do not care which version is more correct. I don't even really care if the 95k version from September was more correct than the 65k version we have now. It might be, I don't know. I don't care if it was created by sockpuppets, or if the reversion from it was valid. I do care that a user appeared out of nowhere to revert an article back four months without discussion; I do care that two users immediately appeared to defend that edit, having had no previous experience with the article; and I do care that these users have all used universally bad faith edit summaries in their attempts to get this version in place.

I have not included Zimmarod in this because his edits are not exactly the same as the others - he did have experience with the article before the last two weeks, and he actually engaged on the talk page. I have also not included Winterbliss as he was mentioned in a previous SSP of Hetoum I and I did not want to pile on. That said, I think he is at least related, since his first edit to the article proper was the mass reversion. But again, unlike the other two, Winterbliss did engage on the talk page.

So, I would like to know if anyone thinks Hablabar and Oliveriki are the same person, and if perhaps they are related to Xebulon or Hetoum I or someone. I don't know if this calls for Checkuser, as I said, I don't do this often, but it's not often I'm angered enough to stop beating the articles around with a sock full of nickels and actually bring it to higher authorities.

I apologize again if any of the above is in poor form, and please let me know if I can fix anything. Golbez (talk) 05:15, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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08 February 2012
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Suspected sockpuppets


Something is clearly going on here, and requires a thorough check up. The above accounts came to my attention after appearing one after another on the talk on Nagorno-Karabakh, all agreeing with each other and making identical comments. If one looks at the history of the above accounts, they all have something in common. All those accounts are new, they were created between 1 October 2011/present, soon after the previous bunch of Xebulon socks was blocked. All were created by the same pattern, the very first edit is to deredlink the user and talk pages to look like an established editor. Wikistalk shows that all these new accounts have similar editing interests, [34], the focus is Nagorno-Karabakh, Caucasian Albania, and related articles in Armenia-Azerbaijan related topics, especially various obscure monasteries in the region. In my opinion, we have here the long term disruption by the same user who operated the accounts of Verjakette (talk · contribs), Paligun (talk · contribs) and Xebulon (talk · contribs). These old SPI requests show that those sock masters also used the same tactic of using multiple accounts to edit war and create illusion of consensus on talk pages. Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Verjakette, Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/Erkusukes, Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Paligun/Archive. Usual tactics for Verjakette/Xebulon is to have a couple of main accounts that do most editing, and a whole lot of SPAs that do edit warring, voting, etc. The previous tandem was Vandorenfm (talk · contribs) + Gorzaim (talk · contribs), now it seems that Winterbliss and Nocturnal781 took over from them. Winterbliss is a particularly interesting account. For a new user he knows his way around Wikipedia all too well, filing SPI and arbitration enforcement requests and showing familiarity with events that took place before he registered in Wikipedia, and this was noted by admins as well: [35] A previous CU on Winterbliss showed that "Based on technical evidence it's   Possible that Winterbliss and Oxi42/Xebulon are controlled by the same person". [36] And then it is also worth looking at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Agdaban massacre. Agdaban massacre is quite an obscure article. It was nominated for deletion by Nocturnal781. If you look at the above list, many of the accounts listed there have already voted for deletion, including a brand new account of Spankarts, who only made 2 edits: the first one, as one could expect, is to deredlink his user page, and the second one to vote in support of Nocturnal781. The history of CUs on the socks of Verjakette/Paligun/Xebulon shows that they very often managed to evade the CU, and were often caught after 2 or 3 checks. The most recent example are Vandorenfm (talk · contribs) and Gorzaim (talk · contribs), who were checked twice without any results until the third CU showed that both accounts are used by the same person. In my opinion, the sockmaster uses either open proxies (which he has done in the past), or frequently travels to change location, or engages meatpuppets in other locations, who make edits for him. But the contributions of all accounts are essentially identical, which may indicate that they are all operated by one master. I suggest the above accounts are checked against each other, but also against the recent socks of Xebulon, which I think are Oxi42 (talk · contribs), Vandorenfm (talk · contribs) and Gorzaim (talk · contribs). Grandmaster 15:05, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. I just noticed that Golbez also saw that something strange is going on and filed his own SPI request. I suggest the admins merge both SPI requests together and combine the evidence. The CU is absolutely necessary, but SPI should not be limited just to that. Behavioral analysis is also important to prevent further disruption. Grandmaster 15:16, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Also, it is worth looking at the results of the CU that led to the ban of the previous bunch of socks of Xebulon. [37] Please note that all those socks were used to edit war on the same article of Nagorno-Karabakh, which was noted by the admins who conducted the CU. Grandmaster 15:33, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The thing is that the CU at least twice showed no connection between Xebulon (talk · contribs), Vandorenfm (talk · contribs) and Gorzaim (talk · contribs): [38], [39]. However a later check gave a different result: [40] Therefore I think one check is not sufficient, and repeated check was necessary, as something is clearly going on here, and it is not just me, Golbez, who is a Wikipedia admin, also sees very strange things happening in the article about Nagorno-Karabakh. Grandmaster 18:38, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Also, is it possible to check if these accounts use open proxies or some other tools to change their IPs? Grandmaster 18:48, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In response to Golbez, maybe the admins should do what Moreschi did on the same article of Nagorno-Karabakh a while ago, i.e. simply block all the quacking new accounts that pop up one after another to edit war there. Here's the list of the accounts that he blocked back then, and most of them were later proven to be socks: [41] Also, the article Nagorno-Karabakh attracts a lot of sockery, and certain special measures need to be applied. I suggest that only well established accounts with at least 1 year of active contributions to Wikipedia, including outside of AA conflict, should be allowed to edit such contentious articles. Otherwise banned editors will be finding ways to evade community bans. Even if the present set of suspect accounts is banned, I'm sure there soon will be a whole lot of new ones, doing the same thing. Grandmaster 22:55, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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

Statement by Winterbliss

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This report filed by User:Grandmaster is a continuation of bad-faith, disruptive SPIs pushed over, over, and over again by a tightly-knit team of Azerbaijani users who target unrelated accounts in a coordinated fashion with the purpose of limiting editing activity on specific pages, by falsely accusing unwanted editors in sockpupetry. In the recent past such reports were routinely filed by User:Tuscumbia, who got topic banned several days ago for one year on the charge of WP:BATTLEGROUND and racist comments about ethnic origin of academic references [42]. Just a few examples of Tuscumbia's most recent fishing trips: [43], [44], [45], [46], [47]. That is how Tuscumbia’s practice of harassing SPIs was described by an independent Lothar von Richthofen:

"Checkuser is not for fishing. If you can present actual evidence other than "they make edits that I don't like and it makes me mad so I want to harass them with SPIs on the offhand chance that they will turn up to be the same people, then maybe a new Checkuser might be in order. Otherwise, your invocation of phantom sockpuppeteers is borderline disruptive.→ [48]

User:Grandmaster who was so far editing on an on-and-off basis with rather long periods of absence from WP suddenly hit the Nagorno Karabakh talk pages one day after Tuscumbia’s removal from AA area, picking up right where Tuscumbia left off [49]. Grandmaster’s and Tuscumbia’s behavior is identical: conspiratorial accusations in sockpuppetry, repeating the same points over and over again, a method of filibustering a consensus used most recently by User:Tuscumbia in talks on Murovdag. User:Grandmaster acts as User:Tuscumbia’s placeholder, if not as his loudly quacking meatpuppet who came to man the post of his banned comrade as soon as Tuscumbia got into trouble.

It has been known that Grandmaster was coordinating editing of a large group of Azerbaijani user in Russian wiki from here information on meta-wiki and here [50] by being the head of 26 Baku Commissars. There is also evidence that Grandmaster uses off-wiki coordination on the pages of English wiki as well: take a look at this curious exchange - [51], [52], which are requests of off-wiki communication between Grandmaster and User:Mursel. Mursel replying to Grandmaster, and Grandmaster confirming that he e-mailed Mursel back: "Salam kardas necesen? Senin e-mail ne dir kardas, bir suzum var sene?? Sağ ol. Bu səhifənin sağ tərəfində E-mail this user linkını basıb mənə yaza bilərsən. Grandmaster 14:55, 11 March 2006 (UTC). Bro your e-mail doest work, it says you havent confirmed it yet. If you can’t get it fixed mail me at farhad87AThotmailcom. I'll mail you my question to you there. Leave a message here if you have sended the mail. Hi. I forgot to enable it, it is OK now. I've already e-mailed you."

User:Golbez says he is a self-appointed watchman of pages related Nagorno Karabakh and says he is impartial but his behavior raises a few questions. So far he supported felonious User:Tuscumbia and User:Brandmeister (each are/were recently topic banned of one year for disruptive conduct), and was freezing the Nagorno-Karabakh article on the versions supported by these two users. He praised User:Tuscumbia as someone who “follows the rules” on the very day (!) when Tuscumbia got banned after exhausting himself in multiple WP:BATTLEGROUNDs [53]. Here Golbez teams up with Grandmaster, supporting his disruptive idea [54]. And in this SPI Golbez wants to ban bona fide normally behaving users arbitrarily simply because the sockpuppetry investigation (where he again took sides and teamed up with User:Grandmaster) did not produce good enough results.

I am not saying that Golbez and Grandmaster are the same, but if we move to the obscure art of duck testing as Golbez proposes, these two accounts could easily be seen as working together. I suggest to prohibit or limit these disruptive SPIs and finally hold accountable those who files them relentlessly and in bad faith. And Golbez should do more to demonstrate that is can act objectively.

Please everyone assume good faith and cooperate on talk pages. Winterbliss (talk) 22:14, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding the comments by Golbez (who, if my memory is right, I consider to be one of the better-informed administrators and generally OK in his aims and actions): "Shall I start issuing blocks based solely on the duck test?" Is this a warning or is it meant to be ironic? "Since they were found to be unrelated, I am left with few civil options." ....erm .... since they were found to be unrelated you really have no business making further discussion about them in relation to sockpuppetry, and to continue otherwise is an example of bad faith. "Behavioral evidence is clear that they are puppets [sock or meat] of someone, I just don't know [or really care] who." - a Lothar von Richthofen translation for that might be "they make edits that I don't like and it makes me mad so I want to harass them with SPIs". "I do not care which version is more correct" - WHY do you not care, WHY do administrators in general not care? If you all care you might be better able to understand edits and the actions of editors. "These users have all used universally bad faith edit summaries in their attempts to get this version in place" - that probably is significant; truth and facts generally do not need the support of bad faith edit summaries, deceptions generally do because they are more difficult to explain and justify. But bad faith edit summaries encourage more bad faith edit summaries which encourage even more bad faith edit summaries, and many editors do not use edit summaries properly at the best of times. Meowy 02:22, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
And here is a sugestion. Why do you not just unblock Hetoum and Xebulon? Problem solved. No more sockpuppetry allegations. I have zero belief that ANY of the names mentioned are actually Hetoum or Xebulon, but if they are that anxious to edit, to the extent that (if the SPI initiators are to believed) they make multiple accounts and travel the world to make their edits, why not just let them edit! if the fxxx-up, they can always be blocked again, and this time you will know who you are blocking. If they don't fxxx-up, it means they will now be acting constructively so why bother keep blocking them. Meowy 02:33, 17 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
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These accounts have all been checked (see this page) and have been found to be   Unrelated. Rechecking today still shows this to be the case. I'm frankly quite frustrated that this case and Hetoum I case continue to be filed every few weeks against the same users. As far as I am concerned, this is disruptive and pointless. I'm inclined to decline future filings on sight, but other opinions from checkuser/clerks are welcome. TNXMan 17:52, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Shall I start issuing blocks based solely on the duck test? And I think my statements in my proposed investigation should make it clear that I did not know they had already been suspected of being sockpuppets of Hetoum I. Behavioral evidence is clear that they are puppets [sock or meat] of someone, I just don't know [or really care] who. But, since they were found to be unrelated, I am left with few civil options. --Golbez (talk) 19:17, 8 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
29 February 2012
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Suspected sockpuppets

While there has been controversy over some of the reports filed here recently, this appears to be a very strong case of WP:QUACK.

Nagorno-Karabakh article:

  • [55] User:Szeget, a confirmed sock of Xebulon reverted the removal of material added by various Xebulon socks.
  • [56] [57] User:Repin3, another Xebulon sock restored that material twice.
  • [58] User:Oliveriki steps in months later to restore the exact same material with an illogical edit summary.

Culture of Nagorno-Karabakh article:

  • [59] [60] Two editors revert the removal of tags by Xebulon.
  • [61] [62] Oliveriki reverts both of those editors.

That is pretty much all of Oliveriki's edit history. Save for some minor tinkering and a previous case of removing a tag, this account has acted only to restore changes made by Xebulon and that editor's various sockpuppets that have been previously reverted. The Devil's Advocate (talk) 08:05, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

@TnX CU can be tricked and I am sure you are aware of that. I think the behavioral evidence is more than sufficient to point to this account being a sock.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 17:26, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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


Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments
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Please see my last note in the archive regarding this account. TNXMan 14:12, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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