Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Steverci

Steverci

Steverci (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

Populated account categories: confirmed · suspected

For archived investigations, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Steverci/Archive.

03 October 2021

– A user has requested CheckUser. An SPI clerk will shortly look at the case and endorse or decline the request.

Suspected sockpuppets

• ‎ZaniGiovanni (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Kevo327 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Achemish (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

• Tools: Editor interaction utility • Interaction Timeline • User compare report Auto-generated every hour.

Steverci has a history of socking in the AA2 area. He was unblocked in 2019 under the condition that he stops, yet there's some suspicious recent activity. He now appears to support at least two other accounts, ‎ZaniGiovanni and Kevo327. Zani in particular shows up whenever Kevo runs out of reverts. Here, for example, Kevo327 reverts the same place Steverci did. After that ZaniGiovanni appears to revert the same article. ZaniGiovanni and Kevo327 are also currently active in related Shusha massacre article. They also support each other particularly in Azerbaijan article by reverting the same text ([1], [2]). All this suggests that at least these two accounts may be interconnected. ZaniGiovanni also joined Steverci's thread elsewhere to advocate him. Kevo went particularly rogue by removing WikiProject assessments from talk pages of Azerbaijan-related articles: [3], [4]. Achemish appears to be related too, here, for example, Achemish was joined by Kevo327 to revert the same place. Brandmeister^talk 10:18, 3 October 2021 (UTC)

Comments by other users

Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.

@Brandmeister: I'm not sure how appears to support at least two other accounts is strong evidence of socking in and of itself. Until reading the above, I was unaware of the alleged master's past socking problems, which do raise a bit of concern. However, I'm not sure that the evidence provided against ZaniGiovanni is all that strong. The two editors may generally share a point of view within WP:AA2, but their writing style appears different and they appear to have differing secondary interests. On top of that, their time cards (Steverci's card, ZaniGiovanni's card) appear to indicate that, if this were a single person, that they would never be asleep. It's certainly possible that a sockmaster could be an insomniac who is very good at remembering to edit from certain accounts only at certain times, but I really don't think that the case as it pertains to ZG is strong. I'm not familiar with the other two alleged socks, so I won't make a substantive comment on their behavioral patterns. — Mikehawk10 (talk) 02:09, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

I don't exclude the possibility that those accounts may be WP:MEATs and requested checkuser in that regard. However, I suspect that at least ZaniGiovanni and Kevo327 may be related to each other one way or the other, also note their common reluctance to participate in talk page discussions of articles that they revert. In Shusha, for instance, ZaniGiovanni and Kevo327 have reverted multiple times recently with relatively little talk page input. Steverci has been their primary advocate there. Brandmeister^talk 11:59, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

• I've not noticed any obvious behavioural similarities between these editors, and I'm not seeing any compelling evidence in the report. There's nothing surprising about the fact that 3 active Armenian editors, who all watch and participate in the same AA2 disputes, frequently jump in to disagree with Azerbaijani editors and back up each other's arguments (or reverts). The same thing happens among Azeri editors, and it's not much to base a socking accusation on by itself. Jr8825 • Talk 16:47, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

I think Kevo327 is a very suspicious account. This user mostly pops up to revert or vote, but otherwise it made to notable contributions. The account was created on November 15, 2016, but started editing one year later, on November 3, 2017. Looks like a sleeper. No articles created in 4 years. Note reverts on Kanach Zham, with no participation in talk: [5] [6] Same on Shusha massacre, turns up to rv article, no talk page participation to explain himself: [7] [8] Very often both ZaniGiovanni and Kevo327 revert same articles to "stable version", claiming "no consensus": [9] [10] Another edit war here: [11] involving both ZaniGiovanni and Kevo327 revert warring with a subsequently banned account. Again, no discussion at talk. Note both accounts claiming "no consensus" and reverting Shusha to a version that also had no consensus: [12] [13] Kevo327 looks like an SPA, it makes only mobile edits, and I think it needs to be checked for connection with other users. It could be someone's alternative account. Grandmaster 12:30, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

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