I usually wouldn’t care about this kind of semi-trivial issue, since it’s so hard to prevent that it’s pretty much inevitable, but anyway: There’s a long-time infosec.pub user that has multiple accounts and likes to make comments and then upvote their own comment from their alts.

And, also, predictably, they have some childish behavior in the comments in addition, adjacent to the desire to bolster their own comments so they can “win” the discussion.

Is this something the infosec.pub community cares about or wants to do something about? I’m pretty sure I’ve reported them in the past without much coming of it.

  • PhilipTheBucket@ponder.catOP
    91·
    5 days ago

    Here’s some of the voter fraud, since the person is squawking at me about what they’re doing is “upvoting people I follow”, which definitely is not what’s happening.

    SELECT p.actor_id, cl.score, cl.comment_id, cl.published FROM person p, comment_like cl WHERE p.name = 'demesisx' AND cl.person_id = p.id ORDER BY published ASC;
              actor_id              | score | comment_id |           published           
------------------------------------+-------+------------+-------------------------------

(some excerpts:)

 https://infosec.pub/u/demesisx     |     1 |    1961075 | 2025-02-22 16:22:56.014731+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1961075 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.325286+00
 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1961075 | 2025-02-22 18:03:18.236992+00

 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958485 | 2025-02-22 18:03:19.371003+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958485 | 2025-02-22 18:00:50.886344+00
 https://infosec.pub/u/demesisx     |     1 |    1958485 | 2025-02-22 11:23:42.226386+00

 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958643 | 2025-02-22 18:03:19.093138+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958643 | 2025-02-22 18:00:50.944788+00
 https://infosec.pub/u/demesisx     |     1 |    1958643 | 2025-02-22 11:57:14.571075+00

 https://infosec.pub/u/demesisx     |     1 |    1958775 | 2025-02-22 12:18:29.561662+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958775 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.007097+00
 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958775 | 2025-02-22 18:03:19.019653+00

 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958789 | 2025-02-22 18:03:18.814704+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958789 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.063719+00
 https://infosec.pub/u/demesisx     |     1 |    1958789 | 2025-02-22 12:20:44.963274+00

 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958826 | 2025-02-22 17:59:48.55791+00
 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958826 | 2025-02-22 18:02:49.300343+00

 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958827 | 2025-02-22 18:00:16.302578+00
 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958827 | 2025-02-22 18:03:20.336056+00

 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958832 | 2025-02-22 17:59:48.497287+00
 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958832 | 2025-02-22 18:02:49.359749+00

 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958871 | 2025-02-22 18:02:49.420568+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958871 | 2025-02-22 17:59:48.43862+00

 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958873 | 2025-02-22 17:59:24.697018+00
 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958873 | 2025-02-22 18:04:55.884635+00

 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958875 | 2025-02-22 18:04:55.795094+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958875 | 2025-02-22 17:59:24.792819+00

 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1958877 | 2025-02-22 17:59:24.743799+00
 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1958877 | 2025-02-22 18:04:55.84273+00

 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |    -1 |    1958982 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.647423+00
 https://infosec.pub/u/demesisx     |    -1 |    1958982 | 2025-02-22 12:55:05.047563+00

 https://programming.dev/u/demesisx |     1 |    1959091 | 2025-02-22 18:03:18.551263+00
 https://infosec.pub/u/demesisx     |     1 |    1959091 | 2025-02-22 12:55:40.650352+00
 https://slrpnk.net/u/demesisx      |     1 |    1959091 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.138157+00

    I added some spacing to make it easier to read. All of those overlapping votes on the same comment_id in a single grouping, from for example, [email protected] and [email protected], that’s voter fraud. It’s demesisx using their multiple alts to vote simultaneously on the same comments. Often their own comments.

    So like this comment they upvoted from three of their own alts. There are also some other overlapping votes with the same username from various instances on that comment, too, it wasn’t just demesisx.

    It’s actually not always some kind of heated debate. Sometimes it’s just something innocuous which for whatever reason they’re upvoting from an additional one of their alts after they post it.

    It looks like there are other accounts on @infosec.pub and other instances involved, but I’m not quite sure what the line is in terms of publishing people’s private voting information. If the admins feel like weighing in on what’s acceptable (maybe just sending the evidence to them in DMs), I can say more and call out some of the other accounts involved.

    Why there is such significant overlap between “I make fake votes” and “I hate the Democrats all good leftists like me don’t support Democrats,” I guess is left as an exercise for the reader.