Why are account farmers still left to roam free in the forum?

Alone055

full member

Activity: 1035

Merit: 200

Quote from: LoyceV on January 11, 2023, 12:47:59 PM

Someone did that, and it caused a lot of drama. Short version: not everybody thinks publishing PMs is a good thing.

I guess it's not a very good idea then. I don't want to get into any trouble myself as it becomes very difficult to prove things once everything gets complicated.

Quote from: _BlackStar on January 11, 2023, 03:48:15 PM

Here he is: [Investigation] Fighting The Account Mafia

I think the idea is trap, but that's fine if the OP really wants to do it. It's a difficult operation, but it may be worth it. Your success rate depends only on how you trick the seller and collect data from all accounts, but I think now they move more after the previous incident. Good luck ^{[if OP really want to do it].} I just don't want to waste my time talking to scammers.

Thank you for the link to that thread, I believe I was inactive during that time, so I wasn't aware it was already tried once or twice. And I think I will need to rethink about this and see if I can go with it. Although I feel that it is worth a shot but after reading that thread and all responses. in this thread and in that as well, I will need to think it through.

Mpamaegbu

legendary

Activity: 2716

Merit: 1225

Once a man, twice a child!

Sometimes, I force myself to look at the way theymos runs this forum as the best way. He's liberal to the point that he doesn't want members to be unnecessarily hurt. Clamping down on the excesses of members which aren't covered in the forum rules as prohibited will be an arbitrary use of power and I believe that isn't what theymos wants. OP, closing such threads or banning such members who indulge in account or merit sales isn't stated anywhere here. So, the best disciplinary approach to it is what other members do to culprits of such by tagging those accounts found guilty. By doing that the bought accounts are rendered useless because they can't achieve the aim for which they are purchased – to get into signature campaigns.

skarais

legendary

Activity: 2464

Merit: 2094

Quote from: lovesmayfamilis on January 12, 2023, 01:52:36 AM

Marking with a negative tag is also a big question today. Not everyone agrees that an account should be tagged if it's not causing any harm. But this is of course not entirely fair, as among the newcomers there are people who are desperately trying to move up in rank, just like purchased accounts, with the goal of participating in the future in subscription companies, but they are honestly working to raise the rank.

Of course, not all users will use its power to handle cases of selling accounts for various reasons, but I'm sure there are always users who care about this activity. It's not fair, beginners have to work extra hard to get rankings and I agree with you here.

So that's why forum users dislike of account selling and negative tag are trying to stop it. The problem still won't be solved and the sale of accounts will still occur, but efforts to stop it are also necessary especially when it's done blatantly.

Lucius

legendary

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Quote from: Alone055 on January 11, 2023, 12:31:48 PM

I was thinking that someone (from DT1/DT2), for the sake of knowing the accounts being traded, create a new account and message the seller pretending to be a potential buyer and ask him (the seller) to show him the account he is going to buy so that he can check the post quality and everything. Once the accounts are revealed to them, they should get back to their original accounts and tag those accounts so that the seller cannot sell them and bears the loss.

It's just an idea that came up in my mind, and I think it can work (unless the seller is reading this right now Roll Eyes

).

Quote from: _BlackStar on January 11, 2023, 03:48:15 PM

Here he is: [Investigation] Fighting The Account Mafia

The thread only has two pages, and the OP and some others didn't even bother to read all the answers, so they ask the same questions and give the same answers that already exist... Sometimes I wonder if I'm writing in Chinese so no one understands me, or if it's something else in question... Roll Eyes

Quote from: Lucius on January 11, 2023, 06:45:25 AM

However, there are those who still fight against those who do this, and most of you must have noticed that there is a thread about it in Reputation -> [Investigation] Fighting The Account Mafia

lovesmayfamilis

legendary

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✿♥‿♥✿

Quote from: skarais on January 11, 2023, 11:03:19 AM

Quote from: Alone055 on January 10, 2023, 01:26:19 PM

I know that it is not prohibited but they should be hunted down and negative tagged to stop such activities.

So what do you think about how to stop such account selling activity, Do you have any ideas?

So far, account sellers and accounts that are known to change hands are most likely marked with negative tag, that is the consequence of not being liked by forum users. But as you can see, they are also unstoppable despite being hunted and tagged with negative tag. The basic rule is, "account sales are allowed, but account sales are discouraged".

Quote

18. Having multiple accounts and account sales are allowed, but account sales are discouraged.

Marking with a negative tag is also a big question today. Not everyone agrees that an account should be tagged if it's not causing any harm. But this is of course not entirely fair, as among the newcomers there are people who are desperately trying to move up in rank, just like purchased accounts, with the goal of participating in the future in subscription companies, but they are honestly working to raise the rank.
Here is the last case with a purchased or hacked account, as you can see, the owner himself did not answer the question asked whether he was bought or is the real owner. And the neutral review that appeared in him still does not raise objections from him.
Someone here wants to use a red paint gun?

The Sceptical Chymist

legendary

Activity: 3374

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Quote from: BitDane on January 11, 2023, 06:05:42 PM

it is more profitable if those accounts are enrolled in a campaign so selling them is like selling at a loss.

That may well be true, but there are some people who either don't want to or can't (because of time constraints or language issues) participate in sig campaigns, and if you've been here long enough you know that account sales are real--even Legendary ones with the potential to earn decent money.

But all that being said, who knows if this offer is a scam? It could be, and even if it's legitimate I expect the prices shown were posted with the expectation that a potential buyer is going to try to negotiate a better deal. $299 for a Legendary account seems incredible to me, but since the merit system basically makes it impossible for the average shitposting campaigner-wannabee to get to that rank, those accounts might actually sell for that much.

Crazy.

BitDane

sr. member

Activity: 1372

Merit: 348

Quote from: _BlackStar on January 11, 2023, 03:48:15 PM

Quote from: BITCOIN4X on January 11, 2023, 03:08:02 PM

Quote from: Alone055 on January 11, 2023, 12:31:48 PM

I was thinking that someone (from DT1/DT2), for the sake of knowing the accounts being traded, create a new account and message the seller pretending to be a potential buyer and ask him (the seller) to show him the account he is going to buy so that he can check the post quality and everything. Once the accounts are revealed to them, they should get back to their original accounts and tag those accounts so that the seller cannot sell them and bears the loss.

Some time ago someone with the same idea did it and exposed an account sale. I didn't find the thread at the moment, but it has been done.

Here he is: [Investigation] Fighting The Account Mafia

I think the idea is trap, but that's fine if the OP really wants to do it. It's a difficult operation, but it may be worth it. Your success rate depends only on how you trick the seller and collect data from all accounts, but I think now they move more after the previous incident. Good luck ^{[if OP really want to do it].} I just don't want to waste my time talking to scammers.

I do think too, looking at the prices, a Legendary account selling @$299 and other account prices, I think it is too good to be true, it is more profitable if those accounts are enrolled in a campaign so selling them is like selling at a loss. They are put them in there probably to lure naive buyer and scam them. Who knows, the escrow the seller is talking about might be the sellers another alt account. And anyone got interested and bought those account may be in for a scam.

Account farmers still left to roam free because alt accounts is allowed while account selling is highly discourage, it is not prohibited.

_BlackStar

legendary

Activity: 1064

Merit: 1228

Quote from: BITCOIN4X on January 11, 2023, 03:08:02 PM

Quote from: Alone055 on January 11, 2023, 12:31:48 PM

I was thinking that someone (from DT1/DT2), for the sake of knowing the accounts being traded, create a new account and message the seller pretending to be a potential buyer and ask him (the seller) to show him the account he is going to buy so that he can check the post quality and everything. Once the accounts are revealed to them, they should get back to their original accounts and tag those accounts so that the seller cannot sell them and bears the loss.

Some time ago someone with the same idea did it and exposed an account sale. I didn't find the thread at the moment, but it has been done.

Here he is: [Investigation] Fighting The Account Mafia

I think the idea is trap, but that's fine if the OP really wants to do it. It's a difficult operation, but it may be worth it. Your success rate depends only on how you trick the seller and collect data from all accounts, but I think now they move more after the previous incident. Good luck ^{[if OP really want to do it].} I just don't want to waste my time talking to scammers.

BITCOIN4X

legendary

Activity: 1974

Merit: 1150

Quote from: Alone055 on January 11, 2023, 12:31:48 PM

I was thinking that someone (from DT1/DT2), for the sake of knowing the accounts being traded, create a new account and message the seller pretending to be a potential buyer and ask him (the seller) to show him the account he is going to buy so that he can check the post quality and everything. Once the accounts are revealed to them, they should get back to their original accounts and tag those accounts so that the seller cannot sell them and bears the loss.

Some time ago someone with the same idea did it and exposed an account sale. I didn't find the thread at the moment, but it has been done.

After all, if you are interested in continuing with the idea and trying to disclose account trading transactions then you just have to do it. You only need to get the seller and the name of the account to be sold where you can confirm it with valid evidence.

Quote from: Alone055 on January 11, 2023, 12:31:48 PM

It's just an idea that came up in my mind, and I think it can work (unless the seller is reading this right now Roll Eyes

).

Only do it if you are sure, but I think the seller will be more sneaky than you can imagine. Check the reputation.

LoyceV

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Quote from: Alone055 on January 11, 2023, 12:31:48 PM

I was thinking that someone (from DT1/DT2), for the sake of knowing the accounts being traded, create a new account and message the seller pretending to be a potential buyer and ask him (the seller) to show him the account he is going to buy so that he can check the post quality and everything. Once the accounts are revealed to them, they should get back to their original accounts and tag those accounts so that the seller cannot sell them and bears the loss.

Someone did that, and it caused a lot of drama. Short version: not everybody thinks publishing PMs is a good thing.

hugeblack

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Activity: 2506

Merit: 3645

Buy/Sell crypto at BestChange

If it's easy for them to collect merits, then it's easier for you to rank-up 3-5 accounts, and then join signature campaigns instead of selling those accounts.
Most of the accounts that are sold will be either pre-established merit system or have very low merits rate.
Add to this all the risks related to the possibility of exposing the account, obtaining negative trust, and other problems.
Only idiots would buy those accounts *if they were real and not scams*

Alone055

full member

Activity: 1035

Merit: 200

Quote from: skarais on January 11, 2023, 11:03:19 AM

So what do you think about how to stop such account selling activity, Do you have any ideas?

I was thinking that someone (from DT1/DT2), for the sake of knowing the accounts being traded, create a new account and message the seller pretending to be a potential buyer and ask him (the seller) to show him the account he is going to buy so that he can check the post quality and everything. Once the accounts are revealed to them, they should get back to their original accounts and tag those accounts so that the seller cannot sell them and bears the loss.

It's just an idea that came up in my mind, and I think it can work (unless the seller is reading this right now Roll Eyes

).

skarais

legendary

Activity: 2464

Merit: 2094

Quote from: Alone055 on January 10, 2023, 01:26:19 PM

I know that it is not prohibited but they should be hunted down and negative tagged to stop such activities.

So what do you think about how to stop such account selling activity, Do you have any ideas?

So far, account sellers and accounts that are known to change hands are most likely marked with negative tag, that is the consequence of not being liked by forum users. But as you can see, they are also unstoppable despite being hunted and tagged with negative tag. The basic rule is, "account sales are allowed, but account sales are discouraged".

Quote

18. Having multiple accounts and account sales are allowed, but account sales are discouraged.

Pandu Geddon

hero member

Activity: 826

Merit: 583

Quote from: Alone055 on January 10, 2023, 01:26:19 PM

I know that it is not prohibited but they should be hunted down and negative tagged to stop such activities. I understand that the merit system is already old, I was an active member when it was first introduced and I understand all the pros and cons, but we need to keep filtering such stuff to further clean up the forum.

Merit trades will not occur for higher ranks. maybe buy 10 merits to be able to rank up Member. but that won't be enough for someone to join the signature campaign. although some are open to lower ratings.

Quote from: Alone055 on January 10, 2023, 01:26:19 PM

Some managers accept average posters in their signature campaigns, and account buyers only purchase accounts or merits to bypass the rule for getting some merits in the last 120 days which is a requirement for most signature campaigns these days.

I'm not sure it can help merit buyers to participate in signature campaigns.
what percentage can he be accepted when the merit is only small, and he is not an active member of the forum?
the campaign manager will not only see the number of merits earned in 120 days. with accounts like that, I doubt they can compete with other accounts that deserve Merit.

we can only supervise and if something goes wrong with account trading and Merit, we can carry out an investigation.

Lucius

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Quote from: The Sceptical Chymist on January 10, 2023, 01:44:17 PM

By the way, I have the Digital Goods section on ignore. If anyone sees an account that isn't a throwaway trying to buy or sell a bitcointalk account, shoot me a PM and I'll tag them with the trusty red paint gun.

From what I see on all the accounts that deal with that activity, it seems that most DT members have that board on ignore, and if you look at each of those accounts, you will see that they have only 1 or 2 red tags. In the past, even the question about the possible purchase of a BTT account was punished with a red tag, but the approach has obviously changed over the years.

However, there are those who still fight against those who do this, and most of you must have noticed that there is a thread about it in Reputation -> [Investigation] Fighting The Account Mafia

Accardo

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Quote from: Sandra_hakeem on January 10, 2023, 06:26:01 PM

This has been done right from time; even before CHYMIST got registered in here, but this is still what we got ? Does it mean there's never a time this would end? ..... sometimes i keep wondering how it was before the meritocracy.

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

Reputable members work strides ahead to stop such practices, especially for users that break the forum rules in the essence of account farming. They've been a member who was tracked down on this thread https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/--5356476 he had made jest of the forum's merit system by giving merits out to his accounts and vice versa, just to boost his more than 61 accounts, yet not all his accounts were banned. It's quite difficult to trace these activities considering the hard work and time invested by @Ratimov to achieve this strenuous goal of investigating his victim. Though it's worth it for the cleanliness of the forum, but for such a forum like bitcointalk where it's not a strict rule not to farm account it's difficult to wipe out such people like you're suggesting. Considering that it's still feasible to farm account despite the merit system available that means before the merit system got introduced it was a league of spam

Sandra_hakeem

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Quote from: The Sceptical Chymist on January 10, 2023, 01:44:17 PM

The merit system has eliminated a lot of account farmers. There's no way it could have failed to do so, since it's made it orders of magnitude harder to rank up multiple accounts as was common in the pre-merit days.

It has definitely... But you seeee, people will always take an advantage of whatever loophole is left unsealed -- as long as it's gonna pay 'em back someday, they won't mind going a long way just to get it done. It's prolly no one's fault that these guys are still bypassing the well-designed barrier -- to the point that Merit is sold for some few bucks? Sheesshh!!

Quote

I'll tag them with the trusty red paint gun.

This has been done right from time; even before CHYMIST got registered in here, but this is still what we got ? Does it mean there's never a time this would end? ..... sometimes i keep wondering how it was before the meritocracy.

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

drwhobox

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Quote from: Alone055 on January 10, 2023, 01:26:19 PM

Quote from: drwhobox on January 09, 2023, 04:44:37 PM

I wonder who is that escrow member he has and how people believe the escrow manager.

The guy said in one of his comments in that thread that he got connections in the forum. He can probably also use one of the accounts that he has as the escrow, if he got one with positive feedback.

What a guy! He is probably logged in with another high ranked account to escrow the deal and get it done. Plus the high ranked account has a good reputation because he is selling various types of accounts so managing one is not that complicated for him.

I am curious how these deals get completed.

LoyceV

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See:

Quote from: mprep on July 21, 2014, 01:27:51 PM

Q: I saw a guy selling Bitcointalk accounts. Why is that allowed?
A: Since we can't effectively prevent these sales (proxies, TOR, sales on other forums), we don't because otherwise we would be giving the users a false sense of security.

The Sceptical Chymist

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Quote from: digaran on January 09, 2023, 05:31:58 PM

Quote from: drwhobox on January 09, 2023, 04:44:37 PM

What a way of doing business, offering escrow too. I wonder who is that escrow member he has and how people believe the escrow manager.

No problem on the escrow part, usually DT1-DT2 members trustworthy enough to hold the funds, whether they have a moral code or not, is their busuness

Yes, and this discussion has been had at least once over the years, and while everyone can voice their opinions about what they think is right nothing is going to change from the administrative end. I've said before that I don't fault an escrow for ensuring a safe transaction even if it's between two motherfuckers exchanging bitcointalk accounts for money.

The merit system has eliminated a lot of account farmers. There's no way it could have failed to do so, since it's made it orders of magnitude harder to rank up multiple accounts as was common in the pre-merit days. This fucker referenced in the OP could have had those accounts for a long time or could have purchased them himself; it's not a fault of the merit system or of the forum.

By the way, I have the Digital Goods section on ignore. If anyone sees an account that isn't a throwaway trying to buy or sell a bitcointalk account, shoot me a PM and I'll tag them with the trusty red paint gun.

Topic: Why are account farmers still left to roam free in the forum? (Read 377 times)