How do you deal with trolls?
 

I'd be interested in finding out what tactics you all use when dealing with trolls?

What are you favorite anti-troll tactics? Hacks? etc...

I like to use the miserable user hack, Tachy goes to Coventry, ban IPs. But we still can't keep out some trolls who use IP spoofers etc.. and continue to register under different aliases.

I've always gone with the unconventional approach. If someone's 'trolling', give them a place to do so where they don't annoy people. E.g. if somone keeps starting controvercial topics, it's important there's a controvercial topic forum. If someone keeps trying to post porn, make sure they're a hidden forum for porn.

It honestly don't believe in banning people who are labled as trolls, rather do my best to assimilate them and keep my other members happy.

Spammers on the other hand...

Either Bans, or Miserable Users for the more persistant ones.

There is a hack around here somewhere that sends IP Addresses to Moderation. It puts them in the Coppa section.

That has worked really well for me. You can moderate an entire city if you want to or all of AOL. I've only used it once, but it was the only thing that worked on someone that was a real problem.

I have a "Troll cage" where I send them once they are determined to be a troll. The troll cage is just a forum that the regular members cannot see, but the person in the cage and the mods can see it. The only other group that can see it is my "shit talking" group, compriomised of the members that love to talk trash. These members have opted in to that group after agreeing to the terms. The "troll" is then made a thread and if he responds, it gives him a chance to speak his peace and convince the worst of my memberbase his worthiness. If we had determined that he will be forgiven, he is released back into the forums. If not, he will spend eternity in the cage. Its quite fun actually, and keeps the trash off the regular forums.

Interesting method, Strangsta...and I've had people talk about doing this before...have been tempted to do it myself, but am afraid of one thing. What if this cage is actually appealing to some members? I mean, I'll admit, it does sound pretty interesting to me...so what if word gets around and people start acting rowdy in hopes of being thrown in the cage? I know it sounds crazy and like a bit of speculation, but who knows...it could happen

If thats the kind of members you have, then the ones that require such attention probably belong there. It is not somewhere they WANT to be. I have disable every other feature on my sire i.e profiles, member searching, arcade, chat etc so they cannot use it. Remember, this is punishment, make it feel like it. :banana:

It's not the kind of members I have, I was just curious :) ...because I could easily see it happening

I'm working for a big company in Sweden where trolling is a big problem sometimes. I've developed a small tool for our moderators, to check usernames against their ip. The tool does'nt warn on trolls but our moderators can easily scan for new nicknames in this database, to see if anyone has registered or posted with another nick before (posting is not required with this tool). The only problem is that this database grows fast, depending on the forums size and it's not completely foolproof. If some users uses the same proxy or ip, for example, there will be a lot more matches than we want.

- The good thing is that we've stopped some users before they even reached the threads... Most of the times, it really works... :)

We warn, kick and ban whenever necessary.

I run a respectable gaming community. As many of you who play online games are aware that a large portion of the gaming world is filled with immaturity. It comes with the territory. We tolerate very little on our gaming servers and Ventrilo. On our forum it really depends on the nature and type of bickering going on. Sometimes people feel the need to state their case so we allow but monitor them closely. Personal attacks we lay the law quickly.

It's not been a big problem for me, but the couple of times I've had a troll I just locked them into one forum only, and then gave them as good as they were giving (under an alias nick of course). They surrendered pretty quickly.

/me used to be an expert troll and can still be if I can pluck up enough anger and am awake enough to maintain it.

Hey...You'd fit perfectly in the gaming community. :D

put them in a speical usergroup. where they only have one forum to post that crap in...

We used to have a forum called "Coal Chamber" which allowed users to speak their minds in a raw manner. That worked out quite nicely.

yea we have one called "dirty laundry"

Hehe. I love that name.

With my current setup there is only the dungeon that I could lock them into, but that isn't really what it is designed for, so I'd need to create a new forum to lock them in if I start having problems again.

I never thought to do any of this! Thanks for the ideas :D

I, for one, would be most interested in seeing that tool. ;)

Mine it called the Steam Room for letting off steam. ;)

I think a hack already exists here. There is one for multiple IP's for one user and another hack for alt nicks. Err...I think. :)

I think he said he developed one, though. That's the one I was curious about. ;)

I just put them in miserable users... don't set the options too high so they can't see anything, but just enough to annoy them so that they leave ;)

He did. I have nothing further to add. :p

[high]* Boofo sings "I got the Freesteyelz" to the tune of "I shot the sheriff". ;)[/high]

A serenade? How unexpected. :confused:

Damn, I thought he said Cherryade ... :)

yea we have a vent/rant forum too thats called "Head Banger's Ball" LMAO

I've been looking for such tools, myself, but it seem that most of them are based on ip's registered at the newuser signup or the postings. This tool, register everything even if the users do not write anything or is'nt logged in (that's why it's growing faster on larger forums).

The result is, however, that if a user signs up with three nicks from the same ip, and then switches ip, logging in again but only writing with one of them, we can still trace all three nicks to the same user.

Edit: Where can I find the hack for multiple IP's? I'm curious :)


I can try to rewrite the source to be a plugin/product instead, if this is wanted. :)

Yes, please, and if you need any help, just let me know. ;)

Absolutely! A product, it will be. :)

I only have 84 users so far (my forums are less than a month old) so this hasn't been too much of an issue for me yet. Plus my site is of an adult nature... so it's more... liberal with language.

However, I do have some experience with these people and the first thing they get is the miserable users group which is generally enough to aggravate people right off the site, but some will stick with it and post crap as often as that group will let them.

the next step for me is my "timeout squad" this gives users full range over the site to see anything as if they were regular members but takes away their right to post. now THAT frustrates the hell out of the rowdy ones. It's like letting them see stuff to start trouble about but keeping it just out of reach. I normally get PMs shortly thereafter, asking to be able to post again if they promise to behave.

so far, so good

I find giving them a mentor, someone to look up to can be helfpul.

And I already told you that I'm too busy for that right now. :cross-eyed:

I will bann the trolls
After a month or 2 I will merge this users with 2 member IDs *(all trolls are merged into this members)
this removes them completely from system, without affecting the flow of threads/posts

I use the miserable users hack. I have the redirect option set to a really nasty porn site. LOL

I don't have any problems. The most we get is 1 a year. In which case I ban them. Been lucky so far.

Or that will attract trollers. :)

we don't waste any time...we ban them!

Well I had to ban my first member tonight, but luckily remembered about the Miserable user hack so I installed LOL

I do like the idea though of putting them into a forum just for them to post on hehe