Talk:Spam blacklist/Archives/2010-02

MZMcBride removed this entry. Wikipedia claims that the domain is not a real TLD and is used for URL redirectors. On that basis, I think it should be re-added with a preceeding dot: \.co\.cc\b  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 19:43, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Having had to deal with a lot of the spam links, I strongly endorse restoring this link. No offense, MZM, but this one should have been discussed first before removal. --Ckatz 10:05, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

It's clearly not just being used for URL redirection. As the Wikipedia article notes, it can be used as a real DNS. .com is capable of URL redirection and brings in a lot more spam. I don't think blacklisting an entire TLD or ccTLD (real or not) is a good idea, though I can understand it's the simplest solution. Is there a complementary global whitelist? Do we have any idea how many false positives this addition to the blacklist will cause? --MZMcBride 10:42, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Do you have any evidence supporting your reason for removal? Discussion when working with others is critical, and your flippant response to my query is worrying.

As to the substantive issue: Yes, there will be candidates for whitelisting, that was acknowledged and addressed from the initial request for blacklisting. I haven't seen that the rate is unacceptable, which you simply take as a premise, and we have helped users to request whitelisting where necessary, and will continue to do so.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 14:56, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Flippant? You've globally blacklisted an entire ccTLD, which has broad implications on 700+ projects, plus an unknown number of sites that also use this list. This entry in particular is creating an unknown (and possibly high) number of false positives (I'm only here because there was a local problem at en.wiki regarding what appears to be an entirely valid URL and it was baffling how the URL could be blacklisted). Here's the diff of you broadening the regex—where was the discussion for doing this? I don't see anything in the log, though admittedly the log is nearly impossible to navigate. (If there is no discussion, what was the rationale? Is there supporting data to suggest that the only possible approach here is to block the entire ccTLD, an obviously extreme tactic?) --MZMcBride 16:33, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

I think you missed this.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 16:36, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Are discussions on this talk page archived anywhere? I checked the log (silly me, I know). Reading the old discussion, I'm still baffled about the rationale here. It can be used for URL redirection. So can literally any other domain (top-level or otherwise). That's not an argument to ban any and all uses of it. If there's evidence that this domain is unmanageable and won't result in an excessive number of false positives, I don't have an issue with including such a broad regex. But I'd like there to be some specific data to point to, not just "can be used for URL redirection," which I consider a non-argument. --MZMcBride 16:42, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Not "can" -- "is" (well, "was" until you removed it :D). You can see User:COIBot/XWiki/co.cc for a small taste (too many results to generate the large taste) - or the original request. Anecdotally, yes, we know it was abused cross-wiki; that's why I added it when JzG brought the request here - if not it would have been "add to XLinkBot for enwiki, and we'll attempt to monitor on other wikis with COIBot.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 16:50, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) A question about User:COIBot/LinkReports/co.cc. How is the false positive ratio determined? It looks like the bot finds all instances of the domain (or part of a domain string) being added to a page, but are there are numbers regarding how many of these additions were legitimate? (There are legitimate uses of this ccTLD, right?) --MZMcBride 09:57, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by "false positive" in this context -- the bot cannot decide whether a link addition is appropriate or not since it's a bot.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 05:21, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

After 2 months, do we have evidence of more spamming?  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 21:40, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

  Declined. No more evidence of spamming for two months, and blacklisting this can blacklist potentially good sites. On that basis, this is declined. --Pmlineditor ∞ 06:09, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

A whole collection of those is persistently inserted in certain articles in enwiki, dewiki, and mnwiki, and ruwiki and others. Most if not all of them are inappropriate links for Wikipedia purposes (forums, unreliable sources, travel business promotion, etc.). They arrive through IPs from the following Russia-based ranges (plus those I didn't notice):

• 85.26.164.0/24
• 85.26.165.0/24
• 85.26.232.0/24
• 85.26.233.0/24

--Latebird 22:38, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

  Added. --Pmlineditor ∞ 06:21, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

IP got globally blocked as per request. Adding in few minutes. — Dferg (talk) 22:29, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

  Added — Dferg (talk) 22:35, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

See COIBot report. MER-C 09:34, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

  Added — Dferg (talk) 13:45, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

See:

• w:Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam/2009 Archive Dec 1#medicanalife.com
• w:Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam/2010 Archive Jan 1#medicanalife.com
• w:Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam#medicalvideos.eu

Same AdSense ID. MER-C 10:23, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

  Added. --Pmlineditor ∞ 05:27, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

I removed links from some wikipedia projects. Mosca 15:48, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

  Added. —Innv {ru-ws} 05:41, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Cross wiki spam of links to a wiki like website (with copyrights) where authors get money for every view of their article. This page gives an overview of the 10 top editors (wiki wide) and a list of their activities on nl.wikipedia.org. The top editors can all be linked to an infoteur-account (which gets them their money) due to the fact that the IP or account is only adding links to articles by one infoteur. JZ85 13:10, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added Huib talk 13:13, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

See [1] MER-C 05:26, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added. --Pmlineditor ∞ 13:30, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Spammed on en wikiversity en wikinews

Spammed the pages "Buy 20 mg acomplia online" and "Buy 250 mg amoxil online" at Wikiversity before deleted. Ottava Rima 00:17, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 02:48, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

URL shortener. MER-C 02:47, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 02:50, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

No redeeming value. See WikiProject Spam item. MER-C 03:59, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added Huib talk 05:31, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Would someone with the power to blacklist a website globally please email me? I do not want to post a link to it here. Thank you in advance. PCHS-NJROTC 18:29, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Hello PCHS-NJROTC, if your request involves private or sensitive information please email it to OTRS to info-en-l@wikimedia.org. OTRS volunteers are tasked with handling cases that involves private or sensitive information. Thank you, — Dferg (talk) 18:38, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

When emailing them, I received a response indicating refusal to work with this via email. I prefer not to post links to this site where search engines may find it, so... PCHS-NJROTC 01:27, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

What ticket number did you get? FWIW, I think it already did get blacklisted.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 01:32, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I spoke to PCHS, the site has already been   Added when Alison noticed it from the oversight request. James (T C) 06:34, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Links spammed by IPs 122.49.210.50, 62.80.184.178, 119.111.124.194, 24.107.14.189 and lots of single purpose accounts. See also research-service.com request

Already blacklisted:

• bestessay.net
• bestessays.ca
• bestessays.com
• besttermpaper.com
• request:
  • bestdissertion.org
  • bestessays.com.au
  • college-paper.org
  • essaymill.com
  • research-service.com
  • superiorpapers.com

--Jorunn 17:00, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added. & thanks for spotting these. --Finn Rindahl 17:24, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

This is related to the Essay spam above:

--Jorunn 09:08, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added. —Innv {ru-ws} 09:31, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

URL shorteners. Gavia immer 03:41, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added. Thanks. --Erwin 08:41, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Link spamming in images and articles, has been active on multiple different wiki projects, but I recently removed the spam links. Cirt (talk) 19:57, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

  Added. Regards, —Innv {ru-ws} 01:02, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Thank you! Cheers, Cirt (talk) 08:15, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

Welcome and thanks for your help, —Innv {ru-ws} 11:14, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

I believe the site is inherently useful to provide news about what is going on in Israel. Israel is a tiny country but an important one in world affairs. IsraelNationalNews (Arutz Sheva) provides accurate news though it may sometimes be written from a right-of-center POV. (Like Fox News, perhaps?). It is useful its Israel news, its information with respect to Judaism, as well as for its opinion pieces where appropriate. It expresses the opinions of a number of Israelis as well as right of center Jews world-wide. [2] [3] [4] [5]

"The site reaches over 138K US monthly peoople, attracts a more educated, 50+ , rather male, mostly Caucasian following" In fact, quantcast has the stats here and notes that the audience for this site are also likely to visit ynetnews, National Review, Weekly Standard, Jerusalem Post, Washington Times, spiegel.de and the Wall Street Journal. According to the quantcast report, Israel National News "offers news, live radio broadcasts, political commentary, Arab press coverage and a video gallery. Also available in French, Russian and Hebrew" If it were a spam site, would a "more educated" people be likely to read it? This is not a spam site and I don't really understand why it is on this list. Thanks for consideration. Stellarkid 04:56, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Note) Poster has confused Israel National News (which is not blacklisted) with Israel News Agency (which is). See here for details. 71.231.168.41 06:12, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

  Declined for now at least, this site is not blacklisted and haven't been shown real reason to remove the other. Feel free to ask again if needed. --James (T C) 06:01, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

User Tommo on nl:wikipedia requested this link to be delisted[6]. He deems this a useful link. I had a look and the site contains a database of european footballmatches since 1872 so it might be valuable as a resource or reference. Since 12 links remain on 3 projects I think delisting is in order. The reason for blacklisting was that one user kept placing that link on various projects (en:, ru:, uk:). If this continues we should assess if blacklisting is the best option. I'd rather go for a (global) block of this user and if possible his IP-address. EdBever 10:46, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I must say I am inclined to accept this and take this off given that we have had a couple requests for removal. Looking at the original spam report it was definitely put on here for a reason but it was indeed all one person and 1. they may have given up and 2. it may be better to deal with that away from the blacklist. I will of course point out that you can remove it right away by adding it to nl:MediaWiki:Spam-whitelist but that is of course not always ideal. If we have enough people asking to use it (including Tommo who appears to be a fairly active user) it may be time to take it off and see what happens. Because of the previous denials and the fact that this would be my first removal I'm going to put this   On hold for now but if either they agree with me or don't answer my pings here or on IRC within a day or so I'll take it off :). James (T C) 11:04, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

  Removed per the above.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 12:27, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I am not quite sure why the mentioned website is considered as a spam, this website has been used as a reliable resource for many historical and archeological subjects since 1998 as it holds its credibility from its connections with many accountable univesities such as University of London. The page that I needed (cais-soas.com/CAIS/History/hakhamaneshian/Cyrus-the-great/cyrus_cylinder.htm#Shapour Suren-Pahlav) is a reference for the Article of "Human Rights" (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights); I will appreciate if an admin look into the website and make the necessary decisions about this educational resource to be removed from the spam list. Thank you. Armaiti (talk) 02:23, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I would be inclined to say no but we can discuss it, this was put on the list on in 2007 mostly because of this (a huge amount of copyright infringement). For reference the old discussions about removing it from 2008-07, 2007-11, 20007-08 and 2007-05. The original one in May 07 references an OTRS report, I do not know what happened to that and someone with access may want to check on that. I will note that looking at the website now it appears they have added a section on the copyright page that says that some content is reprinted with permission from other sources (including the sources and problems that were issues in the past) of course I wasn't able to link to the page like I just attempted to :/. Depending on the OTRS ticket and the history we may want to check to verify that? James (T C) 11:49, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I also had some interactions with the people adding the links, who were all associated with the site. So spamming was a problem as well as copyright. JzG 19:44, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure this should be removed (& note that cais-soas.com has little credibility on copyright issues, after fraudulent GFDL notices). However, the entry seems to predate the wiki-specific blacklist. It could be moved to enwiki's blacklist, and monitored for abuse elsewhere. Once that's done, we'd remove it here.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 12:23, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

If I recall correctly, this site carries many articles in violation of original copyrights, and is generally a non-reliable source (and it was abused). Knowingly linking to information which is in violation of copyrights is more a foundation problem, then a local wiki problem, and should be avoided.

As Hu12 recently put it on en.wikipedia: "This site was blocked at Meta after being identified as carrying images and content in violation of copyrights [7]. This site violates w:WP:Copyrights, Linking to copyrighted works. Linking to copyrighted works, Knowingly and intentionally directing others to a site that violates copyright has been considered a form of w:contributory infringement in the United States (w:Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry ^[8]).^[9]. Additionaly wikipedias servers are located in the United States, it's of no benefit, nor in wikipedias intrest to link this site." (diff).

I do indeed believe that it pre-dates the local blacklists, and that the problem was local, but seen the copyright problems, I would be inclined to leave it here, and request local whitelisting for those documents that are needed and do not impose a problem. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} (en: U, T) 12:48, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but the issue is whether there is, in fact, (still) an issue of copyright infringement. Looking at the tickets in OTRS, it isn't a clear issue. How recently has this been assessed? Until it's shown to be the case, I'd prefer to see this on enwiki's local blacklist.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 13:19, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

True, you might want to ask Hu12 when he assessed that, but I'd err on the save side for now. I'd rather see proof that it changed before we change the situation. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} (en: U, T) 10:07, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

• Note - cais-soas com/CAIS/guideline_contribution.htm (Their inclusion standards) are not for academics or really have a trustworthy peer reviewed process, so there is little ability to say that the works are more reliable than, say, a Wikipedia article (and Wikipedia is not deemed a reliable source, after all). cais-soas com/CAIS/about_cais.htm (This) suggests they are no longer affiliated with a university, though was founded by two academics from a university. The lack of affiliation and the consistent attempt to promote the site through Wikipedia would suggest to me that there is more spam than academic benefit from this site. Ottava Rima 02:33, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

  Declined per analysis from Beetstra and Ottava (thanks!)  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 02:53, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

This domain was owned by the the linkspammer and vandal wayne Smith - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Long-term_abuse/Universe_Daily

Because I repeatedly reverted his edits, and blocked his vandalism at other sites, he created a domain with my name and pointed it to his foul racist and anti-American hate pages. He has since lost the domain and I own it now. Yale s 16:36, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

The top of the page states: "Typically, we do not remove domains from the spam blacklist in response to site-owners' requests." Is there another reason to delist besides the fact that you now own it? However, you do appear to have many contribs as per the secondary statement. Just curious, but what would the link be used for if unblocked? For personal reasons? I ask because it is bare in content and seems to serve no function. Ottava Rima 02:45, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for replying. As soon as I took control of the domain name I parked it on safe and benign page. Previously it was used to redirect to whatever filth and hate that Smith chose. Search engines no longer have my name associated with that nasty content because of the safe current page. I may or may not develop the page further (probably not). I have not the slightest intention of posting that URL as a link on any wikipedia location now or ever. The reason I would like it off the spam blacklist is that the list is mirrored all over the web. If you google the domain name you see it as part of multiple blacklists. Please help me clean up the mess that that linkspammer has created. Thank you again. Yale s 07:49, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

  Removed. --Erwin 08:35, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

Removed yales.info as well as that domain doesn't seem to point to an actual website and was added in the same regex as yalesimkin.com. --Erwin 08:39, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

Completely innocent website of the TV station WKRG-TV. I'd like to use an article from this site as a reference at Hawaii's 1st congressional district special election. Thanks. 79.74.148.184 22:34, 1 February 2010 (UTC) (aka Hysteria18)

After reviewing, it appears to me to be a legitimate news station with articles attributed to many of their televised reporters. Ottava Rima 23:18, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

  Removed. yea looking at the reports from en it may have been spammed a bit at the time (may) but it is definitely a legitimate site and as long as it doesn't get abused I'm fine with it off especially since I can't find a formal request for it being added anywhere. --James (T C) 02:40, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

I have no idea what this was added. I've used this source several times in the past on wikipedia, but was just informed that it was blacklisted. 71.221.81.150 22:33, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

  Deferred to English language Wikipedia — The domain is not blacklisted on meta but it is on en.wikipedia. You should ask on en:MediaWiki_talk:Spam-blacklist#Proposed_removals for consideration. Regards, — Dferg (talk) 22:37, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, it is blacklisted on en.wikipedia. First, it was abused, secondly, it is a pay-per-view site where the large majority of the site is unreliable, scraped information. For this you might want to go to en:MediaWiki_talk:Spam-whitelist to whitelist the specific document. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} (en: U, T) 15:27, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Please unlist this site. It contains usefull additional information about Zone of alienation, at least for ukrainian wiki. Erlier this site had an url www.kranz.com.ua but now we must update it. Thank you --A1 14:36, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm going to remove this, looking at the COI report that led to it's addition I'm not totally sure it was really being spammed as they appear to be legitimate links (and the site requires links rather then references). If it continues to be a problem we can block the IP to since it was all one IP.   Removed --James (T C) 22:12, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

It's a daily newspaper, see en:Correio da Manhã. Maybe it's not the best example of newspaper (like The Sun in U.K.) but is one of the most selling newspapers in Portugal. It was reported in Talk:Spam_blacklist/Archives/2009-09#Xaman79_spam and added to blacklist although someone noted that it was a newspaper. Mosca 11:32, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

By the way, I only noticed now they are redirecting correiodamanhã.pt to http://www.cmjornal.xl.pt/ but in portuguese wikipedia we have a lot of links to that redirect. Mosca 11:44, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

  Removed. --Finn Rindahl 14:15, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

I had recently added a link in good faith to a model page which was subsequently deemed as spam. I believed the link to be on topic and filled with relevent content but this was obviously not so. I would like the link to be reconsidered and if necessary I shall not repost it. 81.138.124.117 16:18, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• This is not usable as a source and has been spammed. It's not appropriate. JzG 13:46, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Persistent spamming of this website in multiple wikis. It is not a reliable website and I doubt whether it is useful for WMF project.   Declined on that basis. --Pmlineditor ∞ 13:48, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

The site was created with the intention of being useful rather than spam, but I accept your judgement and would appreciate a second chance. If that isn't possible then that's fine, but if you don't ask you don't get. I would however query the usefulness of the remaining external links on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuko, as my addition was based on the quality of the existing links and my site provided links to material unavailable elsewhere. 81.138.124.117 14:35, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Please get it whitelisted on enwiki if you wish. Pmlineditor ∞ 14:36, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

This is the company homepage of a commercial SOA software manufacturer. No obvious reason why to block this site. Fiorano exists since 1997. — The preceding unsigned comment was added by Axelangeli (talk)

The reason for blacklisting can be found here. --Jorunn 23:20, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

• See also this example of the extent of abuse by this company's employees. JzG 23:03, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

  Declined. --Finn Rindahl 23:21, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

I propose that modelinia.com be removed from the Wikipedia blacklist. Wikipedia will benefit from allowing our site to contribute content and make edits because Modelinia is a recognized go-to source for all things model-related. Created by the Executive Producers of Project Runway, Modelinia is recognized as the go-to source for inside access to those models and industry experts. Modelinia works directly and closely with some of today’s top models, including Heidi Klum, Brooklyn Decker, Molly Sims, and Cindy Crawford.

All the information that lives on the Modelinia.com as well as all the information that Modelinia passes along to news sources and publications is completely factual. None of the information or content that is published on the Modelinia site, discussed in the Modelinia blog, or passed through to other press is published without the subjects’ authorized consent. We do not publish any photos or content without signed release forms and all other requisite permissions from the models themselves and/or their representation.

Modelinia should be removed from the blacklist because it is a brand that is rapidly garnering recognition and respect throughout the fashion and beauty industries. Top news sources and top fashion and beauty publications cite Modelinia in their articles as well as seek Modelinia out as a resource when gathering credible quotations, when seeking sound confirmation for their stories, and when searching for inside-access to today's top models.

For your reference, here is a list of top press publications that have quoted, cited, and/or linked to Modelinia.com: • New York Magazine: http://nymag.com/daily/fashion/2009/11/liu_wen_is_the_first_asian_mod.html • AOL Stylelist.com: http://www.stylelist.com/2010/01/12/top-supermodels-share-their-beauty-secrets/ • NBC New York: http://www.nbcnewyork.com/shows/lxnewyork/An_Unusual_Fundraiser_For_Haiti.html • New York Post: http://www.nypost.com/p/pagesix/cub_reporters_K0W0JusuE9MsQHy69HSZXO • Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/09/coco-rocha-veronica-webb_n_455261.html • Associated Press (AP): http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5guNvq6BleX9IkKYKZW6RCTUHkWEgD9DPI8A00

Modelinia should be removed from the blacklist because it is a credible website and brand. More than just a website, Modelinia is the first global media brand dedicated to the best of fashion, beauty, and lifestyle through the eyes and experiences of the world’s supermodels. The site uses totally original, high-quality videos, slideshows, and other digital media content to promote and share factual, up-to-date news on model-, fashion-, and beauty-related content.

Because Modelinia has direct relationships with models, stylists, designers, and other experts, the information that we are attempting to contribute to the content already on Wikipedia is always meant to either correct false information on the existing pages, or to enhance existing content in order to bolster Wikipedia's reputation for credibility and an abundance of up-to-date information. It is in Wikipedia’s best interest, as well as the models whose pages live on the reference site, that Modelinia be removed from the blacklist. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.130.116.103 (talk) 15:55, 20 February 2010

As far as I can see, this link isn't added to the global blacklist - where did you encounter problems inserting this link? Finn Rindahl 19:58, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

This user is almost certainly the same person who was using other pages with links to the blacklisted site (see [10]) and admits association with the site in a whitelist request on enWP. It would be quite surprising if this were not the original spammer. JzG 22:55, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Indeed... Well, anyway this link is blacklisted at English Wikipedia and not (yet) at Meta, so it should be sorted there and not here. Best regards, Finn Rindahl 23:20, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

  Declined cuz there is nothing for us to do. Huib talk 11:18, 21 February 2010 (UTC)