Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Pridemanty

Pridemanty

Pridemanty (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

24 November 2024

– A checkuser has completed a check on relevant users in this case, and it is now awaiting administration and close.

Suspected sockpuppets

Partlyx (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · spi block · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
Tools: Editor interaction utility · Interaction Timeline · SPI Tools

First off, Partlyx has already been banned by Izno as part of the preceding Snarkyalyx SPI launched by Pridemanty themselves.

This SPI is to establish the inappropriate use of secondary account Pridemanty may have engaged in (WP:BADSOCK, specifically to avoid scrutiny) possibly for undisclosed paid editing, using substantiated evidence¹.

For context; this all happens on the article for the bunq neobank where Pridemanty will insist on removing the mostly (bar a single subsection) WP:RS-compliant "Controversies" section, even requesting it be done after the page was XC-protected (then being denied that by Hey man im josh).

2024-05-25T17:58:23: User:Partydoos adds a "Controversies" section to the article
2024-11-08T04:58:31: User:Jakcbay removes this section and adds puffery straight from the bank's website (archive.org)
2024-11-16T23:36:39: User:Snarkyalyx reverts Jakcbay's modifications (upon my suggestion as she isn't a seasoned wiki editor, much less Wikipedia editor)

Chronological evidence (only relevant interactions shown):

2024-11-17T04:02:55: User:Pridemanty undoes Snarkyalyx's revert, thus deleting the section again, citing WP:ATTACK as reasoning
- This is not what that policy describes, being neither an attack or a negatively spun out page otherwise.
2024-11-17T04:46:20 (44 minutes later): User:Partlyx is created
- This username does not exist on the internet (bar an unrelated Instagram account), and can be constructed from Partydoos and Snarkyalyx, both being editors that went against Pridemanty's edit direction
  - Could be an attempt to nominally link them together to levy as a sockpuppet allegation later on. Or just an uninspired choice.
2024-11-17T04:51:19 (5 minutes later): Partlyx wipes the page leaving only the controversy section, thus turning the page into exactly what WP:ATTACK describes
- This will be noticed by Red-tailed hawk 5 minutes later, opening a Talk thread about it.
Partlyx will from this point on act as an additional confusing actor to the edit war that would start, blanking/reverting the page on multiple occasions.
2024-11-19T08:24:34: Partlyx edits the page and mentions competing neobank N26 in a positive light
- 10 minutes later Pridemanty accuses edits to be done in their favor
  - This will be used as title for the ANI thread 2 days later, and will never be expanded upon by Pridemanty even after having been asked to.
- But Partlyx will later mention in Talk that they're not connected to N26. Ah yes, obviously.
- Snarkyalyx will at some point undo this + blanking which Pridemanty will revert, thus restoring the mention to N26. Ironic.
- This is a red herring to discredit all other edits not complying with Pridemanty's prime directive.
2024-11-19T09:11:13: Partlyx undoes a revision by Pridemanty
2024-11-19T09:11:33: Pridemanty reverts that
- This is a 20 seconds delay. The odds of this short a timeframe happening organically are low.

Non-chronological evidence:

Use of LLMs:
- Pridemanty uses AI/LLMs to generate the main body of their responses on Talk/ANI
  - This is made obvious by the fact they post some comments raw and then come back minutes later to add user linking/pinging, which is not native to LLMs that tend to use social/markdown formats instead
  - This creates very weird scenarios where the AI repeats what's been said by the comment above
  - Who calls VPNs/proxies "advanced technical measures"? ChatGPT, that's who.
  - When we do get organic text, it's badly written
- The sample size is only 2 for Partlyx but both the 1^st and 2^nd time we got words from them show a writing style within popular LLM services' defaults.
Both Pridemanty and Partlyx use double quotes around their messages, when nobody else involved does.
- This was pointed out by win8x on the ANI thread
- Clearly visible on the User talk:Partlyx page (1, 2) where Pridemanty is trying to simulate an interaction to appear less suspicious, as the odd nature of that account was already pointed out on the Bunq talk page by this point

Snarkyalyx, win8x, and myself believe Partlyx solely existed to do Pridemanty's bidding in discrediting our², Red-tailed hawk, and Constablequackers' edits which restored the page and/or its controversies section. Pridemanty doesn't strike me as a particularly savvy user which is why I'm requesting CU intervention that will likely show a technical connection.

_{¹ I'm aware this SPI might seem retaliatory (as warned by Izno through wiki mail), however the Snarkyalyx SPI's wording feels like an LLM (ChatGPT, etc), and points to no evidence (only allusions, Patrolling admins, clerks and CheckUsers are not expected to establish your argument for you.); leading me to believe it was only used as an attempt to silence criticism of the filer's actions.}
_{² I did not actually participate on the page itself, doing so would've only added fuel to the edit war.}

– ElementW (talk) 14:00, 24 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by other users

Accused parties may also comment/discuss in this section below. See Defending yourself against claims.

I would second the request for CU for master here against the sock. I am also pinging Izno, who handled the related case, but apparently did not check the master. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 22:22, 24 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
ElementW Your statement, "2 I did not actually participate on the page itself; doing so would've only added fuel to the edit war," is completely false because you did participate when (User:Snarkyalyx reverts Jakcbay's modifications (upon my suggestion as she isn't a seasoned wiki editor, much less Wikipedia editor) and supported Snarkylx's edits on Bunq's talk page and Administrators' noticeboard. Red-tailed Hawk never added the controversies as these controversies are poorly sourced and any seasoned editor will never add them.Pridemanty (talk) 10:03, 25 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If you dared feed a correct prompt to the LLM you're using maybe it would have understood I'm taking about, and I quote, the page itself and not the surrounding Talk and ANI threads. As for Red-tailed hawk's involvement, fair enough, the sentence can make one think they actively restored it; will rephrase. ElementW (talk) 10:14, 25 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
- I would also like to add a request for CU for master here against the alleged sockpuppet. There are some very, very strange coincidences and edits coming from Pridemanty. Constablequackers (talk) 12:20, 25 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
To add on this SPI, bunq has reached out to me yesterday via the helpdesk about the wikipedia edit war. It is clear there is some involvement. Please check what I wrote on the bunq talk page here: The subject of this article (bunq) has identified and contacted me outside of Wikipedia (through the bunq banking app helpdesk) Snarkyalyx (talk) 11:36, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Quick update: I have shared details / evidence with the Wikipedia Arbitration Committee as instructed by multiple administrators. Snarkyalyx (talk) 22:39, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Clerk, CheckUser, and/or patrolling admin comments

Whereas Partlyx was clearly editing to evade detection, I am a little more hesitant to ascribe the same here (not by much). This user is clearly on proxies (or indistinguishable from such) with a user agent that indicates they should generally not be able to edit much less access Wikipedia (for being too old). We usually take this as evidence of spoofing. Besides that, the technical details do not line up with Partlyx and probably the right perspective is to say that check user alone will not be sufficient to close this case. Izno (talk) 00:25, 10 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
- Thank you for the investigation. Pridemanty has gone quiet since all this began and may already be exploiting other proxies to work on whatever other Wikipedia projects they've got underway. I suspect they may dust this username/account off a few months down the road to resume their antics. Perhaps it is an account you should keep an eye on for the indefinite future. Constablequackers (talk) 15:27, 10 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]