so november is not shaping up to be a positive

Continuing Adventures in Hacking

Most of you know copperbadge got hacked, but penknife adds that the comm shoebox_project and user dorkorific have also been hacked. Do not go to those journals.

More information here at penknife's lj.

In non-spambot hacking, because trobadora is like, the queen of finding the scary, and with added batshit, read The Case Against Spiletta (or not as the case actually was) in stop_plagiarism, where you will need to settle down with a drink because this is new vistas of batshit, people. New. Vistas.

I'm going to summarize. Correct me if I'm wrong. No, really. It took a bit to work out.

Spiletta42 was hacked by a RL troll in LJ, email, and AIM in late September. There has been a rash of posting really, really vicious "confession" posts, that led Spinella to be investigated as a plagiarist. There are other usernames involved that are apparently joining communities to post this about her. According to stop_plagiarism and commentors, this is not her. And so on and so forth.

Anyway, read, review, and comm moderators, watch your comms. It looks like they've hit several both using spiletta's accounts and two or three others (can we get a complete list of names and an explanation somewhere please? I'd really like to link to that and not depend on my own reading alone).

Er. Well. That was cheering. Would anyone like to hear something more upbeat, like about the latest stock market drop or something?

That's it. I'm consolidating my crazy tags by the end of the month.

Comments

spiletta42, not Spinella47

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

I think you mean spiletta42? Also, wow do I feel for her. That sucks majorly.

Re: spiletta42, not Spinella47

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Argh. Fixed. I was looking directly at it while writing this up too!

And yeah, I twitched hard. And am checking all my comms for new members.

Re: spiletta42, not Spinella47

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

Oooh yeah. I don't get trolls. I don't see what they can possibly get out of stirring up this much crap.

It's too bad. I'm going to miss seeing spiletta42's default icon. It was definitely unique!

Re: spiletta42, not Spinella47

[seperis.livejournal.com]

...okay, that is awesome.

[amireal.livejournal.com]

That has moved on from "people suck" to "jesus that's scary" *shivers*. Stalking man. I'm not sure if the person thought fandom wasn't that smart, or if they didn't care.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Yep.

And probably didn't care, just mass damage since it's hard to get info out. I'm thinking all comm owners needs a heads up to watch, but I'd really kill for someone to write up a summary and a list of what usernames are doing this and what comms have already been hit. If I knew more, I'd do it myself.

[amireal.livejournal.com]

We're trying to figure out if MF can link to something. And I think you're the winner at this point.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

I think a case could be made for linking to stop_plagiarism in community interest.

This is totally a case for Fandom Wank.

[amireal.livejournal.com]

We thought about it, but your post is much more cohesive and coherent, gives a good summary (hehe) before going off to the linked post.

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

There's also this post on stargate_fanfic: http://community.livejournal.com/stargate_fanfic/216737.html

[amireal.livejournal.com]

I've seen that, but I'd rather not point all of MF to a random comm, that's just not fair all around, unless the comm is meant for that sort of discussion. If seperis wants to add a link to one of the several posts of those I've seen (though having it in the comments is good enough) then I'm okay with that. But as this post will likely have actual conversation and is an individual's journal meant for give and take and not a fic comm that is simply posting a warning, I still have to favor this post.

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

Good point. I didn't realise that's what you were doing. And I *just* realised MF stands for metafandom. :P

[amireal.livejournal.com]

*hee* My fingers get tangled typing up metafandom too much so I've gotten into the habit of shortening it when I don't have to. Alas I should probably NOT do that when commenting.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Man, they got hit hard. That was like, five in a row on that comm. I'm surprised they weren't all deleted.

[amireal.livejournal.com]

I think that's the one where both mods are AFK. The community members did manage to get the post with her NAME AND ADDRESS removed by abuse as that's an infraction that doesn't need to be complained about by the individual in question.

[dovil.livejournal.com]

Wow, I haven't seen a level of internet crazy like that in a while. I almost feel like I need a cigarette.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

I know. There's a vague sense of a hangover going on.

[ariadne83]

The whole situation makes me sick and I feel so sorry for spiletta. What makes it even scarier is that it's apparently a case of an RL troll/stalker extending their activities online. Explains the level of dedication and vitriol, but still - scary as hell.

[niciasus.livejournal.com]

Gah, I started receiving spam from LJ. Whoever hacked my LJ email sent spam to my email addy stored in my profile. I figured my LJ was hacked somehow. So, I changed my password. Setup a new email addy. I was lucky because I don't see any changes to my LJ. I wonder if it was because I don't log out of my LJ. And I didn't click on any of the links in messages. Gah, sick pups with no better to do with their time.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

No joke. *shakes head* It's sick.

[deird1]

I'm going to summarize. Correct me if I'm wrong. No, really. It took a bit to work out.

Okay! Although you're fairly accurate, really.

Actually, from what I remember of the (now deleted) stop_plagiarism post, the initial post there accusing Spiletta of plagiarism was posted by one of the same sockpuppets (furqueen96) that has been trolling other communities (and, quite possibly, hacking into Spiletta's account).

The initial stop_plagiarism post was fairly standard - noting some probable copy-and-pasting by Spiletta (now very definitely disproven).
But, as far as I can tell (not having seen this bit), furqueen96 then edited that post to make it look like the mods had decided that Spiletta was guilty.

furqueen96 and her other sockpuppets then seems to have raced around to a whole bunch of communities, linking to the post, and declaring that Spiletta, as a known plagiarist should be banned.
At the same time, whoever has control of Spiletta's LJ was posting to a whole lot of other communities, confessing to the plagiarism (as well as just about everything else under the sun, probably including puppy-eating), and linking to the stop_plagiarism post.

[spiralleds.livejournal.com]

Yup. That would be an accurate clarification.

[lifesscar.livejournal.com]

Yeah, pretty accurate there. Things moved pretty damn quickly after the post got approved to posting. The poor Mod was pressed in every direction from the actions of the OPer/Troll and then comments being left in the Original Post. She/He posted at a few (I only know Stargate_fic) before actually going back to change the title of the post to say she was found guilty. Then it only sped up into more insanity. The "I'm leaving Fandom" post wasn't made until somewhere in the middle of that whole fiasco.

[out-there.livejournal.com]

Bloody hell.

That's really all I have to say. Just when you think people can't get any meaner or crazier...

[trobadora]

furqueen96 is deleted now. So is the kittyxpete sockpuppet, and the claireandelle1 sockpuppet. Spiletta's LJ is still up, though.

[tavella.livejournal.com]

Spiletta's LJ is still up, though.

Which is part of the reason why I'm... quite doubtful about this entire affair. Given that LJ is if anything *overly* aggressive about locking journals reported for being hacked or abusive, the fact that she claimed it was hacked six weeks ago but apparently hasn't reported it to abuse is... strange.

Combined with the fact that this happens to her repeatedly with her claiming different backstories to the troll, well... doubts are live (http://eye-of-a-cat.livejournal.com/316685.html).

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I was looking around a bit for something more on this and couldn't find anything except for one comment in an lj in September she made under her other lj name. It felt odd, as six weeks is a while for something like this to be going on and no one knows, but different fandoms have different responses, so....

Doing a post on it now.

[jadesfire2808.livejournal.com]

I generally just lurk around here (for, lo, I am shy) and although I saw the link on Metafandom, I didn't think much of it at first. I've been following it with wide-eyed horror all day and have now flagged it up to my flist (which includes a good few mods). It sounds like the whole thing's up to full-blown stalking and it's only slightly comforting that the sock puppets have now been deleted.

I just wanted to say thanks for summing it up and linking to it - the further this gets, the better. Sheesh.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

I know the feeling. When I read it the first time, I actually was like if this turns out to be a social experiment, I'll be *happy* because it was so freaky. God, I feel bad for her. It looks like her friends are watching and contacting the potentially affected communities, so that's something.

And awesome for posting about it!

[jadesfire2808.livejournal.com]

*nods* They seem to have tracked most of them down, and for once, the fannish networks are working properly - as usual, we can reach saturation point with impressive speed :) I feel really sorry for the mod who called it, though - understandable mistake, completely, but... *shakes head* Also, next time I think my plots are getting just a little bit too weird, I'm going to come back to this and remind myself that RL (or at least internet RL) is even weirder

...oddly, that's not comforting...