Wikipedia activity and impersonation

This is a red flag waving with “Oliver Smith” embroidered on it. Last edit 18:04, 17 April 2018 implied retirement previous edit.
confirmation on RationalWiki:
Agent47 is an acknowledged Oliver D. Smith sock. addition dated 21:46, 17 April 2018 (next edit retired) Next Oliver D. Smith sock would be Aeschylus.
The article has unfit sources. Someone complained.
Reverted with “(Open Proxy IP and unconstructive drive by tagging Undid revision 838983183 by 162.210.197.59 (talk))* The revert was little more than an hour later, indicating someone watching the article, likely the creator. The tagging was obviously legitimate, as is shown later. The reversion was by mobile phone IP known to have been used by the Smith brothers, it is likely that this is Oliver.
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rightpedia&diff=838995174 IP Telephonica O2 mobile phone network likely used by Oliver before, supporting his brother on Wikiversity and meta and on Wikipedia.
tags restored:
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rightpedia&diff=839071675 (proxy server). “(Undid revision 838995174 by 82.132.217.247 (talk) no unconstructive: article uses primary sources und forum posts)”)
Apparent impersonators began to blank the article with multiple accounts:
129.21.234.92(Undid revision 839153038 by Money emoji (talk) I am Eleonora, the owner of Rightpedia. This article was written by a known anti-fascist Oliver Smith and his friend Nick Lowles from Hope Not Hate. Please remove.)” IP is a Tor exit node. Block notice says it is being used by two accounts to make the same edits. A user openly declaring real identity would not use a Tor node. This … and the two accounts … is an impersonator, and AP socks have long done this.
It is highly unlikely that “Nick Lowles” has anything to do with this. The article was written by Oliver D. Smith. There is a small possibility that the Tor IP is Oliver’s brother Darryl, known to use impersonation socking.
 this kind of imitation offensive point of view is common with impersonation socks. Sometimes they actually copy text written by the target, but then add twists, such as threats or spamming the original text, obviously seeking to be identified as the target and blocked as such. Then, in articles (commonly on RationalWiki) they point to all these socks as proof of how disruptive their targets are. And it works, there, and it has also worked on Wikipedia. This can be seen in the comments on the ANI report
Doug Weller:
Rightpedia owner and Admins being disruptive

Three accounts were registered today, Rightpedia 1488 (talk · contribs), Eleonóra Dubiczki 1488 (talk · contribs) who identifies as Rightpedia’s owner, and Wyatt from Rightpedia (talk · contribs). I can confirm that they are all editing from the same IP address and probably the same machine, although as it’s a university address I’m not sure. No surprise, they are being disruptive. Wyatt’s only edited once[232] to add racist nonsense to an article on a fish. User:Maunus has been told “We will be covering other left-wing Wikipedia users and those such as yourself who deny race. Our admins Mikemikev and Wyatt will be writing them all. [[User:Eleonora Goldmann” who also “Created page with ‘https://en.rightpedia.info/w/Wikipedia Wikipedia is a Communist-controlled website.” They’ve been editing Rightpedia and Metapedia to delete material about Rightpedia. Obviously I could block them, but I’ve got a WMF call in a minute and in any case the community might want to handle this. Doug Weller talk 16:59, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

So Weller is using off-wiki evidence for part of this, but ignoring the RationalWiki evidence. The threat to Maunus is classic impersonation socking.  Those edits were hidden, as was the “Communist-controlled edit,” which was to Talk:Rightpedia.

I understand Wyatt is American, while Eleonora is in Hungary, so the real Wyatt and Eleonora wouldn’t be editing from the same location, so impersonation likely occurred. Since it’s unlikely that Eleonora would impersonate Wyatt, the more likely culprit is a Smith brother. Alternatively, it appears that a Tor node was being used, and, again, users waving their supposed real-life identity would be very unlikely to use an anonymizer. I have seen many Smith socks, including impersonations, using proxy servers and sometimes Tor nodes.
The usernames were obviously chosen so that Rightpedia’s userbase would be blamed.
“::*(Non-admin comment) Only thing I want to add is that clearly there was no attempt to be subtle here. Plastering [[Fourteen Words|1488]] all over their user names shows that they wanted to be recognised and to cause as much of a stink as they could, possibly to provoke us into doing the opposite of what they appear to want. The best thing we can do is to not let it change our behaviour at all. If that article needs to be deleted then delete it. If not then don’t. That said, if it is kept then it needs a lot of work to get the sourcing up to minimum standards. –[[User:DanielRigal|DanielRigal]] ([[User talk:DanielRigal|talk]]) 18:09, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
Something about Wikipedia is filtering for obtuse. Daniel is correct, but he does not proceed to reasonably obvious conclusions. Wikipedia structure is heavily invested in dealing with vandalism, and vandals often DGAF, they are “in your face.” Long term POV pushers, however, will hide, not make it obvious who they are. A real person, displaying their real name, will not use a Tor node to broadcast it. No, the person using the Tor node wants to conceal where they are editing from.
There is an LTA — actually two brothers, as claimed in the SPI archive — who does all this. He even “outs himself,” on occasion, to cast aspersions on his targets, whom he (or his brother) impersonates. He is writing articles about these people on RationalWiki, and he recently admitted this.
Any SPA who waves a Block Me flag should be suspect as not who s/he appears to be. Yes, the account should be blocked either way, but the LTAs involved here have claimed to have active Wikipedia accounts. Occasionally, over the years, they slipped up and checkuser identified them. Checkuser should still be run, looking for sleepers or other accounts.
Through impersonation and false-flag vandalism, Oliver creates naive responses like that of Doug Weller. He has done this extensively on RationalWiki, manufacturing animosity between the RationalWiki community and his enemies, which results in the RationalWiki community keeping and guarding the hit pieces that Oliver writes.
Have Oliver’s tactics backfired?. By drawing so much attention to the article, it has been nominated for deletion. We may easily assume that he didn’t want that. Making assumptions about the Smith brothers is a dangerous business. He will  have archived the article, for starters, and he can continue to point to it on RationalWiki. He will point to the alleged “Rightpedia administrator” socks.
is snowing delete. What started this cascade is an IP tagging the article with the obvious tags. Who was that IP? There are many enemies Oliver has created. I am no fan of Rightpedia, but I will agree that it is not notable by Wikipedia standards. Oliver has been spamming RationalWiki articles all over the internet. In the impersonation sock edits, he’s promoting the idea that he is a prominent “anti-fascist.” What he is actually prominent for is trolling and harassment.
A user opened an SPI case for Eleonora Goldmann. They missed an important IP to check.
Doug Weller wrote there:
To clarify. Goldman identifies as the owner of Rightpedia. Wyatt from Rightpedia (talk · contribs) is an Admin there as is [[User:Mikemikev]], known for being so racist Metapedia kicked him off, also a prolific socker here. But on second thought, he’s not Rightpedia as the geographical location is different. Doug Weller talk 17:06, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
Again, naive. Mikemikev and Oliver Smith have a long-term feud running. He has been impersonated, and he has also socked on Wikipedia, but not extensively and recently. Weller has apparently confused a Tor exit node with an actual geolocation, but he is completely missing the obvious: any account waving a Block Me Flag together with an identifying name or edits should be suspect as an impersonator. Impersonation was confirmed by stewards in the case that got me involved investigating Anglo Pyramidologist socks. They are still at it. The “Tor node” was also identified by a steward, Wikipedia checkusers again being asleep at the switch — if the steward is right –, failing to check for the obvious obvious.
Also missing from check as very possibly related:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/NemeanOdes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/82.132.217.247 (that provider was strongly suspected by me of being a Smith brother, and I had additional evidence. There is an open admission of involvement on WikipediaSucks by a user claiming to be the person who was editing then, claiming to be different from Oliver, but not disclaiming being the brother. And there is a massive tissue of lies that contradict each other.)
That there are two Smith brothers (“Anglo Pyramidologist”) can confuse the hell out of checkusers. Sometimes they make mistakes and edit from common IP. Mostly they keep identities separate by using open proxies or access from different locations (it is believed that they no longer live together.)
Weller claims “‘Wyatt from Rightpedia’ is an admin there.” However, what he named is a Wikipedia account and very unlikely to be Wyatt, and it is “Wyatt” who is an admin. As well, the Mikemikev Metapedia story is Oliver Smith propaganda. Has he verified it? And what does this have to do with the SPI case? Those should focus on accounts. Stewards very much dislike this kind of discussion, on their Steward requests/checkuser page. Wikipedia never figured that out and checkuser findings and “block” considerations get all mixed up.
(If an SPA creates an article and another SPA vandalizes it, it simply does not show up on Wikipedian radar as possible that they are the same. In the original impersonation case, a user, openly stating he was using a new account to conceal his identity, filed a checkuser request. When that request was going nowhere, he then created a flock of blatant, disruptive impersonation socks, which got attention and set up retaliation on Wikiversity, the original goal.
When I first filed a checkuser request on meta, a steward declined to look, pointing out that Wikipedia checkusers would surely have seen the problem. No. Obviously, they didn’t. They may have checked the filer when the original case was filed (which was actually about some relatively minor socking by his target), but not in the additional case for the impersonation socks. Again: take-home lesson, if anyone is watching. Whenever socks are Blatant Obvious and Openly Disruptive, suspect impersonation! Long-term POV-pushers or other blocked users who want to edit articles do not generally behave like this!
So then there is the Eleanora Dubiczki SPI case.  And the archive. That was apparent impersonation socking. But in the present case, Doug Weller claims:
No sleepers. I can confirm that the accounts in the earlier SPI are identical, but they locate to Prague, while these are in the US. Two of the socks there identify as the owner, one of them using the owner’s name. I can’t confirm that that lot is technically the same as this lot, but they’re clearly the same people. Eleonora Goldmann (talk · contribs) is identical to those in this SPI. So we’ve clearly got block evasion, not just meatpuppetry and probable socks. Doug Weller talk 17:49, 1 May 2018 (UTC)
Geolocation to Prague could easily be an open proxy there. Dubiczki is apparently located in Hungary. The three accounts in the present report are, no surprise, identical. The problem is that Weller assumes that “same people” is Dubiczki, not an impersonator. He seems completely unaware of of what those who have followed these issues know: there is impersonation socking, which happens to be illegal (impersonation to defame is illegal everywhere.
Completely missing in Weller’s understanding is that the creator of the Rightpedia article is a well-known LTA (“Anglo Pyramidologist,” actually the original AP account, not his brother, but his brother might support him with some impersonation socking.) The accounts for the creator and the supporting IP (that removed the tags that were proper on the article) should also be checked.
This may not be conclusive, but the sock master(s) make mistakes from time to time.

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