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Wikipedia:Long-term abuse/Indian military paid editors

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Indian military paid editors
Shortcut: WP:LTA/IMPE
Original name(s)832LT (name of SPI case)
106medregt (first account to be blocked)
Hogmos (first account to be created)
WikilifespanMay 2024-present
Physical locationIndia
Sockpuppet investigationsWikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/832LT
InstructionsReport obvious socks to SPI to be blocked. Tag page creations for deletion under G5.
StatusPending Approval

Basic information

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832LT (talk · contribs · block log · arb · SPI confirmed suspected)
Comprehensive edits analysis
XTools Timecard

The Indian military has embarked on a massive meatpuppetry campaign to promote itself on the English Wikipedia. Their best-known abuse is creating propagandistic promotional drafts, but they also edit existing pages, either adding unsourced promotion or removing content to censor it. The users appear to be rank-and-file personnel who have been ordered to edit Wikipedia.[1] The abuse falls under the contentious topic of India, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Targeted areas, pages, themes

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Indian military, especially regiments and other individual units.

Habitual behavior

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  • Usually uses new accounts, sometimes IPs. Most of these are hyperfocused on a single military regiment.
  • Almost all known accounts are obvious DUCK socks.
  • Creates drafts about Indian military units, especially regiments, in userspace or draftspace.
  • Adds promotional or unsourced content, or otherwise disruptively edits.
  • Blanks material or sections, citing "national security concerns" or "confidentiality" in an apparent attempt to censor it.
  • Nonstandard spelling, grammar, punctuation, style and formatting.
  • Does attempt to communicate at places like user talk pages and AfC.
  • Socks may continue to talk at their user talk pages after being blocked. They may request an unblock, with or without using the proper template. As of June 10, 2024, there has been no case where talk page access has been revoked.
  • As of June 10, 2024, no sock has edited any Wikimedia project besides the English Wikipedia.

Confirmed and suspected accounts

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Notes

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