In the last week, a few of my observations have been the target of bot attacks. All at once, dozens of newly created accounts add incorrect identifications, effectively changing the community taxon. Sometimes, they leave comments and faves too.
Has anyone had this experience or am I the only one? What should I do?
I haven’t personally had it happen (yet), but I’ve seen it happen to some others recently.
Flag the IDs, and a curator can help. We can’t do anything to remove DQA stuff or faves, but we can hide IDs and comments and potentially suspend the accounts.
That’s awful. I haven’t seen it myself. If there truly are bots adding IDs, comments and faves indiscriminately, I would expect that others are seeing the issue. Is it possible this swarm of IDs originated with human students in a poorly managed class project? Or does it not have those fingerprints?
I don’t think they’re real people. All the accounts are created on the same day and then all target my observations specifically. I checked their IDs through their accounts; only my observations are chosen.
I’m beginning to fear I upset someone on iNaturalist and this is their revenge.
The similar instances I’ve seen have generally been the result of someone with too much time on their hands who got mad about an ID correction or a copyright flag, so this does seem likely unfortunately.
How strange. Definitely flag the IDs for curator assistance. I’m happy to help with investigation and hiding. If it persists, we may need staff help (e.g. to see if all the accounts are connecting from the same IP range.)
Just out curiosity, are the comments strange or out of the ordinary?
I’m paraphrasing, but it was stuff like “it’s this” and “C’mon guys, stop making false IDs”.
i saw one of your observations that had flagged malicious IDs, and the usernames seem to be lyrics from a song, so i dont think these are bots, i think someone is targeting you
What song is it?
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/248465909
im not sure if im allowed to say the usernames, but together it gave me the impression of song lyrics, so i searched the words in one of the usernames, and it looks like it is havana by camila cabello
Amazing. I’m so sorry you are having to deal with this, @That_Bug_Guy !
I have seen the comments and IDs, they’re definitely not bots, just someone targeting your posts (as well as some other users’) with inappropriate content.
We can simply report them until they lose interest.
Apparently because I flagged some of those IDs, they started attacking my observations as well
What’s strange is that I didn’t flag their IDs/comments and removed them immediately, I was instantly targeted. Does the action of hiding content send a notification to the user?
I’ve unlisted this topic, someone who’s doing this wants attention and this is giving it to them. Currently if you hide a piece of content your username is shown as the accoun that hid it, I’m working with our devs to prevent that.
What’s frustrating is that iNat’s open and transparent community is being targeted.
Also, I’m sorry this has happened to you @That_Bug_Guy, and to anyone else affected, I don’t mean at all to dismiss what happened and we’re working on removing the content. I just think that a public topic like this may spur them on.
We’ve blocked some IPs of malicious accounts today and are monitoring things.
Oh wow, that one’s even copying my name
