Serial Stalking and Internet Threats on DU and Elsewhere

[MineralMan]

isn't restricted to DU. In fact, there appears to be one particular person who spends his or her days doing nothing but sending out death threats to people all over the Internet, usually in discussion areas or in comments. Using the same verbiage over and over again, in different mixes of standard paragraphs, this person appear to make a habit of trolling message forums and similar places, signing up and posting his or her diatribes in open forums and in private messaging areas.

This person also frequents DU, sadly and is recognized by our intrepid MIRT team, which deletes signups daily from this individual. But, it's not just here. It's all over the internet. Here's a typical line from one of this deranged person's (or bot's) posts:

"Die painfully okay? Preferably by getting crushed to death in a garbage compactor,..."

You can find even more of such posts by copying other phrases from any of them and Googling that phrase in quotes. Thousands of them, all with the same wording mixed in different orders.

It goes on and on in that vein. The same stock paragraphs are used in different orders in these posts and messages, and not all include the line above. Subjects are sexist, racist, political, anti-LGBT and others. There's a lot of variety, but the same blocks of text are used again and again.

If you're interested in seeing how widespread these attacks are, here's a Google Search that will find many, many of them on different sites, from YouTube to FaceBook and many discussion sites:

https://www.google.com/#q=%22Die+painfully+okay%3F+Preferably+by+getting+crushed+to+death+in+a+garbage+compactor%22

So, if you're seeing things like this in DU Mail, alert on them and MIRT will kick the poster off again, as it has done hundreds of times. The screen name changes constantly, but it's the same person or bot that's doing this. Lots of people have worked lots of hours trying to run this down and find the source, but so far, there hasn't been any success.

[anoNY42]

1. This is what happens

when humans create AI!

Obviously the AI is not connected to our nuclear first-strike like Skynet, so it is reduced to merely wishing death upon us all.

[MineralMan]

2. There is an excellent chance that these are posted by bots that

can sign onto sites, post and leave quickly. They're used for all sorts of spam. Given the large number of similar or identical postings all over the Internet, I suspect it's a bot that is being used by multiple people. think of 4chan as a source of people who might do such a thing.

[BooScout]

8. Bots don't send pms....

And Death Threat Guy sends pms....frequently to the same people over and over again. He is NOT A BOT. He's just another sick fucking stalker.

[MineralMan]

15. There's no reason they can't.

No reason at all. It depends how they are programmed. A bot could easily click the DU Mail icon or the equivalent and send DU mail to a poster. That would be easy to do. What they could not do, however, is research someone and find out who they were and contact them or people close to them. Bots aren't that sophisticated.

I'm talking about one particular type of malicious spam in this post. It may not apply to your situation at all. But that particular hate stuff has been sent to people via DU Mail, and I do suspect that it's a bot.

[bettyellen]

17. When there is a person also sending snail mail- it's not just a bot.

It's a sick fucker who has been researching people here and intruding into their real lives.
Please stop making this look like its something impersonal or happening to thousands. It isn't the case here. And your just confusing people talking about tech that might be employed also, but there's a real living breathing asshole doing this with intent to certain women.
It's not at all random or mechanized.

[cwydro]

20. Exactly.

From what I've heard from those here who've been harassed by him - he's no bot.

Just a sick fuck.

For some reason, he puts me in mind of that vile pharm guy...I've forgotten his name. The one with a smile like the Joker.

[Warren DeMontague]

22. Martin Shrkeli

Or perhaps you know him as his superhero alter-ego, "Captain D-Bag"

[bettyellen]

26. Nope- much closer to Uncle Fester, but not as lovable. Sort of like Uncle Fester ...

On meth.
In a basement.

[Warren DeMontague]

27. That dude is really a piece of work.

[cwydro]

32. Ick yes.

Soulless worm.

[MineralMan]

4. More like Artificial Stupidity (AS)

Yes. I suspect this is the work of people running bots on some PC. Spam bots are easy to find out there if you want such a thing.

[bettyellen]

5. Actually the gang of harassed women are working on confirming his ID and

Are considering next steps. Looks like he has a great job in IT.... I'm sure his boss and his wife would love to know about all of this.

[MineralMan]

6. I know. I hope they succeed. I suspect, though, that there's more than

one person doing this, which is why I think it's a spambot program being used by multiple people. There are just too many almost identical posts on too many places for this to be the work of one person, I'm sure.

DU may have it's own individual person using this strategy. I don't know. I do know that the phenomenon is everywhere out there.

Lots of people have been looking for the perpetrator(s) for a very long time. Maybe someday, it will stop.

[bettyellen]

9. I'm sure they're so uncreative that they need to cut and paste from each other....

And also sure that one person alone can do a fuck ton of damage. Consequences matter.

[MineralMan]

14. If it's a spambot doing this, it's pretty much automated, and doesn't

even need a person watching what is going on. The bot could look for keywords in messages and reply when it is triggered, with the reply being a mix of available text strings that could also be tied to specific keywords.

Automation at that level is easy for anyone with even low level programming skills.

There may not be a real person even looking at DU, in reality. Just a bot. I'm not sure, but the amount of this stuff out there seems to lead toward an automated process, rather than a user-directed one.

[bettyellen]

16. Except in the case here the person is actually writing handwritten letters also....

So let's not totally assign this to machines. This is much worse than just spamming.

[MineralMan]

23. I have no details about the specific situation.

My post was about more general malicious activities.

[bettyellen]

33. That's why I informed you- since you cited the situation on DU I thought you should know

You are wrong about it here at DU, bots don't hand write letters. Let's not depersonalize this please.

[SecularMotion]

7. There are new methods being developed to track and "fingerprint" internet trolls

Feds Spend $499,571 to ‘Combat Online Trolling’

“Today, almost every browsing click that users make is collected by numerous trackers associated with a variety of online services (e.g., advertising networks, online social networks, e-commerce platforms),” a grant for the project states. “Users have often expressed concern about the lack of privacy and control over their personal data. Nonetheless, despite a substantial effort to expose and control this prevalent behavior, the reality is that users keep accepting updated online privacy policies, which in turn grant the gathering of more personal data.”

“This project explores re-using this extensive tracking infrastructure for the benefits of both the users themselves and web services, with a goal of preventing online trolling (scenarios in which various groups deploy tactics to influence public opinion on the Internet, by leaving biased, false, misleading, and inauthentic comments, and then artificially amplifying their ratings),” the grant said. “The project aims to show how the tracking infrastructure can be re-used as a user ‘fingerprint,’ allowing a lightweight and privacy-preserving form of identification for third-party web sites.”

The leading researchers on the project, Northwestern University’s Aleksandar Kuzmanovic and Northeastern University’s Alan Mislove, told the Washington Free Beacon that their work could help combat “troll armies” used by Russia and China.

http://freebeacon.com/issues/feds-spend-499571-combat-online-trolling/

[BlueInPhilly]

10. How secure is DU account?

Just want to know. I don't want my email revealed to anyone.

[MineralMan]

13. only the Admins of the site have access to the email address you

gave when you signed up. It's not exposed to the Internet. Your password, too, is safe. DU is one of the few sites where I have not had a password hacked. DU does a good job of protecting your privacy.

[bananas]

21. Several years ago, trolls were made moderators and had access to all personal info

Including your email and other info.

[Autumn]

30. I really freaked out when a moderator used my real name in a PM message to me.

I was glad to see the switch over to the host system. When old DU closed down and we moved here to this system there was an issue with a Mod staying at the old site being able to access the Mod form information over there. That was brought up in the META forum before it was closed down and the admins finally fixed it so that Mod wasn't able to do that anymore.

[bettyellen]

34. Two thirds of those who left to form the Jackass group were perma-mods and

They refused to enforce the TOS for bigotry. They were either rat fuckers or libertarians trying to infiltrate a more viable party. Fuck them.

[Gman]

11. This is a very small and bitter person

who has no life and that's the only power this person has.

I've found while trolling RW FB pages or forums, when I get something similar, when I respond with something like "Bring it you POS! A lot of us libs love the 2A too and you have no idea..." Pretty effective. I just took their power away and they have nothing left.

Bottom line though is stay safe.

[Rex]

12. I hope they catch the asshole, he hides behind a keyboard.

Exposing his real life would destroy him. Long time coming imo.

[muriel_volestrangler]

18. It needn't be one person, and it needn't be a bot

It can be a style, either agreed on among a group, or just copied when one idiot sees it used and thinks "that's cool, I'll use that when I want to be nasty to someone". Given that it has been happening for 10 years or more, and isn't directed at one type of site (I know it was directed at a right wing blogger, several years ago - Michelle Malkin, I think, as well as at places like DU), it's probably several people, either unconnected, or who just hate pretty much everyone.

[Warren DeMontague]

19. If you hang out here long enough you probably encounter one of those lovely PM's you speak of.

I got one, years back, when MIRT ban messages still contained the handle of the DU MIRT member who did the banning- that was, I think, what brought me to that individual's attention.

They're a piece of work, and certainly knowing they are repeated ad infinitum all over the internet (that person seems to have an issue with Japanese and Korean car companies, IIRC- they spam message boards for Hyundai, Subaru and Toyota with the same text) doesn't make receiving one any less upsetting, to my mind.

But it's worth pointing out that the troll/stalker in question that has been discussed here in recent days is quite certainly a different character than that one.

[MineralMan]

24. I haven't been involved in that specific discussion.

I know no details about it, really. This is a more general thread.

[Warren DeMontague]

25. I've done a few turns on MIRT, and there are some different specific "return customers" so to speak

It seems that suspicion is, this is a guy who has been particularly active in the past couple years, and has moved on to hounding people through social media or sending them emails or even actual physical letters.

I hope they catch him, of course it would be nice if they could catch the death threat guy, too. Or whoever is turning loose the bot that writes that nasty crap.

[Egnever]

28. well took me all of a couple minutes to find this

http://mulpwiki.org/index.php/Great_Big_Wall_of_Copypasta

looks like it is a 4 chan group that does it for fun.

Not sure who spent hours on this but this seems pretty straightforward.

[MineralMan]

29. Wow! There it is.

I thought it sounded like 4Chan stuff.

[Egnever]

31. Yea not really surprising

it's just trolls. Apparently unoriginal trolls copying and pasting insults from a list as a form of entertainment.

[uppityperson]

35. Huh, that's interesting, thank you for that. It doesn't have the youtube vid, but interesting it's

there.

And yes, I've made dtg recognition and banning a job.