So I've noticed that there's a little group of accounts all with the same name, presumably the same person with alts on several instances, and they all like to upvote their own stuff from their other accounts with the same name on other instances (and from other accounts which don't have the same name but seem likely to be the same person). Here's what it looks like. (I have redacted their actual username, since I'm not sure if that is acceptable to post in a bigger and not-drama-centered community.)
Each of these little groupings is multiple votes from accounts with the exact same name, all applied to the same comment within a few minutes of each other from (for example) the programming.dev and slrpnk.net accounts, a little while after the infosec.pub account posted it:
SELECT p.actor_id, cl.score, cl.comment_id, cl.published FROM person p, comment_like cl WHERE p.name = 'redacted' AND cl.person_id = p.id ORDER BY published ASC;
actor_id | score | comment_id | published
------------------------------------+-------+------------+-------------------------------
(some excerpts:)
https://infosec.pub/u/redacted | 1 | 1961075 | 2025-02-22 16:22:56.014731+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1961075 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.325286+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1961075 | 2025-02-22 18:03:18.236992+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958485 | 2025-02-22 18:03:19.371003+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958485 | 2025-02-22 18:00:50.886344+00
https://infosec.pub/u/redacted | 1 | 1958485 | 2025-02-22 11:23:42.226386+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958643 | 2025-02-22 18:03:19.093138+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958643 | 2025-02-22 18:00:50.944788+00
https://infosec.pub/u/redacted | 1 | 1958643 | 2025-02-22 11:57:14.571075+00
https://infosec.pub/u/redacted | 1 | 1958775 | 2025-02-22 12:18:29.561662+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958775 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.007097+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958775 | 2025-02-22 18:03:19.019653+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958789 | 2025-02-22 18:03:18.814704+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958789 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.063719+00
https://infosec.pub/u/redacted | 1 | 1958789 | 2025-02-22 12:20:44.963274+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958826 | 2025-02-22 17:59:48.55791+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958826 | 2025-02-22 18:02:49.300343+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958827 | 2025-02-22 18:00:16.302578+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958827 | 2025-02-22 18:03:20.336056+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958832 | 2025-02-22 17:59:48.497287+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958832 | 2025-02-22 18:02:49.359749+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958871 | 2025-02-22 18:02:49.420568+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958871 | 2025-02-22 17:59:48.43862+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958873 | 2025-02-22 17:59:24.697018+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958873 | 2025-02-22 18:04:55.884635+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958875 | 2025-02-22 18:04:55.795094+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958875 | 2025-02-22 17:59:24.792819+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1958877 | 2025-02-22 17:59:24.743799+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1958877 | 2025-02-22 18:04:55.84273+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | -1 | 1958982 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.647423+00
https://infosec.pub/u/redacted | -1 | 1958982 | 2025-02-22 12:55:05.047563+00
https://programming.dev/u/redacted | 1 | 1959091 | 2025-02-22 18:03:18.551263+00
https://infosec.pub/u/redacted | 1 | 1959091 | 2025-02-22 12:55:40.650352+00
https://slrpnk.net/u/redacted | 1 | 1959091 | 2025-02-22 18:00:51.138157+00
The reason I'm bringing this up:
- Isn't this a problem? I get that it's hard (impossible) to prevent this type of thing, but it seems weird that the infosec.pub admins weren't into the idea of it being a problem when I pointed out this super-blatant instance of it to them. I do feel like dealing with blatant Lemmy-fraud when it happens is kind of a good instance hygiene type of thing to do.
- You should know that this user also talks pretty constantly about how the Democrats are bad, and anyone who votes for them is a fool, and Kamala Harris was the one who invaded Gaza, and so on. And they like using their multiple alts to upvote that content of their own. I feel like having that confluence pointed out is relevant.
- Is there something that I should be doing different than just pinging the admin and then moving on with my life if they don't do anything?
I can't exactly articulate why I feel like this is an issue, but I do. This also doesn't necessarily seem like the right place to post this, but also, I wasn't sure where to post it, and so...
This doesn't work though. It has to be sitting, subscribed to get API calls when people do votes, otherwise it won't be able to find out any of the voting information. You can cause Lemmy to dump the comments or posts (up to a point) from a selected actor, but you can't do that for votes. You're either subscribed when the votes happen and available to get a call, or else it's gone for good.
I know a little bit about it. I actually made myself use podman for a deployment not that long ago and I just didn't like it. I think mostly the issue is just that I have not been in a position where I really had to do anything with it, but if I do wind up in one I may take you up on it.
Generally I like to muck around with the code for pretty much any service I am using / hosting. Just little tweaks to make things more amenable to how I like them. Telling docker/podman to do a source checkout and then recompile when I change something in the source in the container was beyond me and it didn't really seem like it was set up with that kind of thing in mind, so I more or less abandoned it and went back to doing "from scratch" installations for any stuff I'm mucking around with.
Probably if I didn't do that, I would prefer the simplicity / reproducibility and such that Docker gives, but that's usually my priority over that.
Yeah, agreed. Like I say, I think it is fine as long as it's clearly communicated to users that the expectation is that. I think without that clear communication, presenting a false sense of privacy, it's wrong.