Gold Spammer Circumventing Ignore

[Strider5548]

There is a gold spammer on Arkenstone right now spamming away. I reported him and added to ignore, and his messages are still coming through. It's happening to everyone on the server.

Someone in world chat suggested we all spam him with tells to get him to stop or at least slow down. I decided to partake. After 10 tells I get this note:

Your account has been gagged by a game administrator. You will be unable to chat until the gag is lifted. Please use the help system to contact an admin for resolution of this issue.

The irony is he is still spamming world chat with gold advertisements, and now I can't say anything in game.

[squirle]

Evernight as well at this moment

[Baelrog]

Seconded, this account spammed repeatedly from around 7:15PM AEST to at least 7:32PM AEST on Arkenstone server

Player was reported as gold spammer and added to ignore list as normal, but I missed the ID.

Took a screenshot showing him in my ignore list and still posting moments later, speculation is that this is some sort of priveleged/GM account that is able to bypass chat restrictions.


(Name & links obscured, GMs please contact for name)

[CaerArianrhod]

This is the case right now on Belegaer too.
"Player" can not be added to the ignore list. So it seems they found a way again to hack the chat server.
Super annoying!

[Sidhien]

Same on Evernight. This one has been reported and ignored but it's messages keep flooding the World Chat.
I hope this is resolved soon by SSG. Screenshot of the chat uploaded: https://imgur.com/vUe3qui

[Strider5548]

Current GM wait times are >1 day. Needless to say I hope I can get some help 'ungagging' my account sooner lol.

[Tenuke]

So it is simply totally impossible to simply not care about someones illegal messages?
People rather try to start spam the gold seller and then qq about getting automatically punished..
Very smart...

How about doing the /report and moving on with your life in the game?

[Braer]

So it is simply totally impossible to simply not care about someones illegal messages?
People rather try to start spam the gold seller and then qq about getting automatically punished..
Very smart...

How about doing the /report and moving on with your life in the game?

Because after reporting/ignore the spam continued...

Perhaps it's a different variety of spammer joining in on the fun?

[MelliBafins]

I just do not understand why everything is shifted to the shoulders of the players. All these reports and ignors. besides, the spammer uses several spam accounts at once and you have a time limit between reports.

Yes, and there are reports and ignore just do not help, and we still see spam, like today.

Is it really so difficult to select a programmer to write an adequate spam filtering system, if you cannot do it on the server side, then do it on the client side so that users enter the words to block in the chat in their settings.

Please react to this already, thank you.

[Cordovan]

Our GMs spent quite a bit of time this weekend dealing with spam, and we apologize if you found an issue with your ability to add these spammers to your ignore list. We'll be looking more into your reports. On the GM side, the spammers were being particularly insistent throughout the weekend, but they - should - have been added to your Ignore list if you went through the process.

[Quenton_1]

Our GMs spent quite a bit of time this weekend dealing with spam, and we apologize if you found an issue with your ability to add these spammers to your ignore list. We'll be looking more into your reports. On the GM side, the spammers were being particularly insistent throughout the weekend, but they - should - have been added to your Ignore list if you went through the process.

The problem is not adding them to the ignore list. Their name appears on the ignore list and the chat messages are still coming through.

[Cordovan]

The problem is not adding them to the ignore list. Their name appears on the ignore list and the chat messages are still coming through.

Gotcha, thanks. We did see a bunch of fire and move behavior on the part of spammers this weekend, so they'd pop on, send a dozen messages, then quickly switch worlds in an attempt to evade GM activity and move faster than the reporting system did. Didn't stop us from getting the job done, but the whackamole behavior remained a big issue this weekend.

[Piedtendre]

The problem is not adding them to the ignore list. Their name appears on the ignore list and the chat messages are still coming through.

This !

They are on ignore and still we have to endure their spamm, how ?

Is your tool broken ?
(chat option > report as gold spammer > tool add the name to the ignore list & fill a ticket > spamm still there ...)

[SotF]

I kind of wonder if there's a situation where enough of them jams up the process of activating the ignore function in chat. Meaning that there's a lag between them being on the ignore and them stopping posting.

[Braer]

Gotcha, thanks. We did see a bunch of fire and move behavior on the part of spammers this weekend, so they'd pop on, send a dozen messages, then quickly switch worlds in an attempt to evade GM activity and move faster than the reporting system did. Didn't stop us from getting the job done, but the whackamole behavior remained a big issue this weekend.

Their tactic all along seems to be to logon send out just a couple of spam messages only on the two active accounts and log off without waiting. They were never in the game to "evade" GMs nor harvest accounts because they never needed to. Their game is just to demonstrate to you who's holding all the cards/accounts, it's them by the way. The last time was mostly level 5 Burglar VIPs (char screen default) and competing entities with the same tech. Only you guys know the account types being used back then but you can't bring yourselves to admit to such security failures.

The anomaly was that you could neither add the name to friends, to check level, kinship and class profile, nor have a report block the spam from our chat. You could however use the UI to add/remove the name in ignore list but had no effect on the spam. People perhaps didn't realise the name was in the list as they made subsequent attempts to report.
I'd take it on face value, an outlier else it would be a thing now, unless it is a thing - not been in game much over the weekend. I'd imagine they'd struggle with the transfer system with this /bugged char too.

Our worry it that you guys actually believe your own rhetoric or it's you being kept in the dark for plausible deniability. Allowing people to infer things isn't a straight out lie though is it? Always a tenuous line to draw, still fine - with Robin in the Chair? Otherwise you might be convinced of a conspiracy of thousands of ex players coming together to take their revenge...

The mole is ancient history, you're eight/ten years late with the whack! And great job on dissuading any real old time players back to find they've been banned - F7 = waiting time > 2 months. Someone at SSG needs to come up with better plans, especially in light of dormant servers and higher-ups intensions towards growth.

[Baelrog]

This !

They are on ignore and still we have to endure their spamm, how ?

Is your tool broken ?
(chat option > report as gold spammer > tool add the name to the ignore list & fill a ticket > spamm still there ...)

Since returning to the game this hasn't been my experience - the report as gold spammer function has created a support ticket and added the player to the ignore list in every situation. Once on the ignore list, no further messages received.

That's what made this particular spammer such an oddity - despite being on my ignore list, the message they posted was still visible in my chat client. See screenshot above.

Our GMs spent quite a bit of time this weekend dealing with spam, and we apologize if you found an issue with your ability to add these spammers to your ignore list. We'll be looking more into your reports. On the GM side, the spammers were being particularly insistent throughout the weekend, but they - should - have been added to your Ignore list if you went through the process.

Our best guess in World chat at the time was that the particular account in question (at least on Arkenstone) was a compromised GM or otherwise priveleged account that had the ability to bypass ignore lists - that was the only conclusion we could reach. Is it possible for certain accounts to not obey the 'ignore' rule? That would be the first place I'd look

[Braer]

Since returning to the game this hasn't been my experience - the report as gold spammer function has created a support ticket and added the player to the ignore list in every situation. Once on the ignore list, no further messages received.

That's what made this particular spammer such an oddity - despite being on my ignore list, the message they posted was still visible in my chat client. See screenshot above.



Our best guess in World chat at the time was that the particular account in question (at least on Arkenstone) was a compromised GM or otherwise priveleged account that had the ability to bypass ignore lists - that was the only conclusion we could reach. Is it possible for certain accounts to not obey the 'ignore' rule? That would be the first place I'd look

Sounds like a much better theory than my /buggy account one. Easy for SSG to confirm you'd think. Needs a known staffer using chat if we are to prove the case.

The question for SSG is that if the account is of a type that can avoid chat ignore can it also use other privileges (like Free LP) and does the char screen display the specific account type so inform the spammer logging in and know they can stick around much longer spamming with impunity?

[Nosdracir]

Since returning to the game this hasn't been my experience - the report as gold spammer function has created a support ticket and added the player to the ignore list in every situation. Once on the ignore list, no further messages received.

That's what made this particular spammer such an oddity - despite being on my ignore list, the message they posted was still visible in my chat client. See screenshot above.



Our best guess in World chat at the time was that the particular account in question (at least on Arkenstone) was a compromised GM or otherwise priveleged account that had the ability to bypass ignore lists - that was the only conclusion we could reach. Is it possible for certain accounts to not obey the 'ignore' rule? That would be the first place I'd look

Interesting. I was wondering if the spammer had managed to create a character using a mixed character set, like Latin-1 with some Unicode, and the UI was translating the mix to all Latin-1 on display. Then you ignore/report the all Latin-1 name and that is the string filtered for on the client side. If the filtering for ignore processed before the display translation then the spammer could keep going until their account got squashed.

Wild guess of course.

[Braer]

Interesting. I was wondering if the spammer had managed to create a character using a mixed character set, like Latin-1 with some Unicode, and the UI was translating the mix to all Latin-1 on display. Then you ignore/report the all Latin-1 name and that is the string filtered for on the client side. If the filtering for ignore processed before the display translation then the spammer could keep going until their account got squashed.

Wild guess of course.

The general profile of the spammer characters (making them friends first, to see) was of long existing characters, even some in kinships, of a level to use /wd chat 5,10 and 20. For me it was a passing thought on ASCII character use But I think these guys must have it right. You'd hope these would be rare just due to internal comms being more open with the need for staff to change passwords at the time. While we players got the nothing to see here line...

[auximenes]

Our best guess in World chat at the time was that the particular account in question (at least on Arkenstone) was a compromised GM or otherwise priveleged account that had the ability to bypass ignore lists - that was the only conclusion we could reach. Is it possible for certain accounts to not obey the 'ignore' rule? That would be the first place I'd look

Perhaps the chat filter/ignore lists weren't updating and/or resolving properly? There's certainly a lot of lag in multiple system lately, like the delay in the game registering that you have exited a mission instance. Maybe the huge uptick in spam reports knocked the system out of whack for a while, kind of like a DDoS attack?

[Cordovan]

Since returning to the game this hasn't been my experience - the report as gold spammer function has created a support ticket and added the player to the ignore list in every situation. Once on the ignore list, no further messages received.

That's what made this particular spammer such an oddity - despite being on my ignore list, the message they posted was still visible in my chat client. See screenshot above.



Our best guess in World chat at the time was that the particular account in question (at least on Arkenstone) was a compromised GM or otherwise priveleged account that had the ability to bypass ignore lists - that was the only conclusion we could reach. Is it possible for certain accounts to not obey the 'ignore' rule? That would be the first place I'd look

I can say with certainty that no GM or otherwise permissions-elevated account was compromised. We're looking into it otherwise, with an eye toward whether there is a halo effect happening related to otherwise not really related work.

[Braer]

Halo has become as popular as "popular" used to be...

I didn't take note of the anomalous character name when it happened on Evernight and irony has it we aren't allowed to name them on the forums

Has SSG determined this particular account from reports and resolved it's account status is not elevated? I assume this is the case ^^

It did occur on multiple servers on one day and I haven't noticed it again or any posts mentioning another occurrence since. Has it become a red herring only now? Having watched Wargames again recently the conspiracist in me ponders on a backdoor account...

With the ability to take over this account SSG could test if the problem was just situational at the time or fundamental to the account seeing as it appears to have been used on multiple servers over that day so not character specific. It thankfully doesn't appear to be in the hands of the spammers to influence.

The MO of course is two accounts spamming at a time and the second one was not so effected indicating account specific.

I'd take a leap and throw a transfer test at the account and see what errors pop out or a BR copy. May throw some light on transfer issues too... but transfer it back for when the previous owner comes back to redeem it...

If not identified a PM to the screeny provider above for the raw image should do it...

[auximenes]

FWIW on Landroval last night a gold spammer popped up and I was able to successfully report and mute them.

[Gildoriel]

I can say with certainty that no GM or otherwise permissions-elevated account was compromised. We're looking into it otherwise, with an eye toward whether there is a halo effect happening related to otherwise not really related work.

This is good to know, but where does the issue of failed ignore list entries come from then? I remember a playing session where in the world chat on the server I was (don't remember if it was Belegaer, Laurelin or Gwaihir (=my current server) someone told me "You can't put me on ignore I'm a GM" - and indeed I was unable to put the guy on ignore even though I wanted to because his chat contributions were rather rude. Do you (= the Devs) know what is causing this? And no - I don't want a detailed answer here to prevent copycats, a simple "yes" or "no" would suffice.

[Nonde]

Inability to put them on ignore was an issue that arose when they were here in force a few years ago - any notes on what the fix was??