The following is a proposal for a change to staff policy, containing the drafts of documents as they will appear in pages on O5. However due to the nature of this proposal, some information is sensitive and only available to staff. If you are staff, see chat for the sensitive addendum.
The wiki has always had trolls, vandalizers, and other malicious actors. However, in the last few years we have seen a few users who have gone above and beyond in the effort they put forward to plague the site, utilizing more than a handful of sockpuppets and requiring a more coordinated staff response to address.
Existing disciplinary procedure has sometimes been inadequate for such users, as they exploit disciplinary requirements, or their behavior intersects with policy edge cases in ways where blind application of the rules as written would be obviously inappropriate. Previously such individuals were handled ad hoc, with implicit invocations of administrative fiat to override normal disciplinary procedure. (See the sensitive addendum for a list)
I am proposing that we create a formal policy framework for handling such individuals. Here I am referring to them as "persistently abusive individuals", or "PAI". (English Wikipedia calls these long-term abuse cases, or LTA).
The policy is not intended to apply generally. 99% of disciplinary cases will continue to proceed as they have do normally: this policy is only intended for recurring trolls who require more custom handling, or where exhaustive documentation / disciplinary thread creation would be an onerous and obviously unnecessary burden.
Below are the drafts for policy documents, as they will appear on O5:
Creation of a policy page /persistent-abuse-policy:
This policy describes special disciplinary procedure for users who continue to be abusive consistently or extensively, or whose activities require customized handling by staff due to the nature of their abuse. Such cases are expected to be infrequent.
Requirements
No user may be designated as a persistently-abusive individual without meeting all of the following qualifications:
- The user has received a permanent ban from the site.
- The user is considered very unlikely to have their ban overturned.
- The user is continuing to extensively engage in abusive behavior.
- Staff believe that normal public logging of offenses is either unhelpful or actively harmful, either to the site, to case management, or to the mental health of staff.
Additionally, the user must not be under the purview of the Anti-Harassment Team. The Anti-Harassment Team has the authority to upgrade a case to their sole purview, at which time team policy would govern management of the case. Likewise, the team may downgrade an existing case to a PAI case, providing staff with the relevant information needed to manage the matter.
Trolls, spree vandals, and other malicious users should receive a normal disciplinary thread like with other disciplinary cases, and should only be upgraded to PAI status if they continue to engage in abuse over the long term, or if extingent circumstances apply.
Procedures
If a user meets the above requirements, and has been designated as persistently abusive by a consensus of staff, then the following altered procedures apply for their disciplinary management. Note that an O5 vote or deliberation on the disciplinary thread is not required for consensus, but instead a discussion should occur within sensitive staff chat.
- The PAI records page is updated with the new user marked as persistently abusive. Notably, no public notice is made of this designation, whether on their Disciplinary thread or other public notice areas of O5.
- Each PAI user will get its own page in the private section of O5. All relevant information regarding the case will be recorded there.
- What information is considered relevant is determined on a case-by-case basis by staff. Remember, the goal is to effectively utilize staff's time rather than record all information exhaustively, and so what information is recorded and how it is structured should be specifically adapted to each troll's modus operandi.
- Any accidental public updates are to be wiped by an O5 moderator/administrator, and moved to the tracking page (if needed).
- Staff are informed internally about the PAI status of the user, and that they are to log any new incidents or information on the tracking page.
- While a PAI status exists for a user, they cannot be considered for unbanning, and are not permitted to submit any ban appeals.
Specific information on PAI procedure is located on the staff-only PAI records page.
Reversal
It should be emphasized that PAI status should only be applied when the extensively abusive nature of the individual is obvious, and there is little doubt that they will potentially become a re-accepted site member in the future. However in the case that a mistake is made, or an unexpected situation arises, this clause may be utilized.
Staff may, at its discretion, lift the PAI status from a user. This may only occur if the requirements for the status no longer apply, and clear extenuating circumstances justify the reversal.
The reversal of a PAI status does not automatically constitute an unban or a state of good standing on the site. For instance, it is possible for a user to remain permanently banned, but to no longer be considered persistently abusive. In this case, a regular disciplinary thread is maintained, in line with standard procedure.
Following a reversal, all private records of the user's activities should be moved to the appropriate disciplinary or non-disciplinary threads on the regular O5 forum. Any other adjustments made as part of PAI management should be undone, according to staff's determination.
Amendment to the Site Charter, tab two (Site Discipline), new section:
C. Persistently Abusive Individuals
Users who have been permanently banned as part of normal disciplinary measures, but are continuing to cause extensive problems on the site, or are taking actions which require modification of disciplinary procedure for their case, are instead governed by the Persistently-Abusive Individuals Policy.
(Note that, when the above page is created, the title will be populated as the link label automatically)
Following this, a fiat record will be posted to the Fiat Records forum recording the actions taken as part of prior PAI user management. (See sensitive addendum)
Main site mirror: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-15134806/discussion-persistently-abusive-individuals-proposal
(account deleted)