UESPWiki:Administrator Noticeboard/Archives/Dropping the Ball on Vandalism

Dropping the Ball on Vandalism Among Other Things
(Note:  The following has been re-organized into subsections and may therefore occasionally read a little oddly.  Some discussion unimportant to the larger issue has been removed - specifically, the "asked and answered" topic of contacting Daveh and the occasional introductory clause or comment that had no substance of its own.)

So recently, we have had two major attacks on the site: one on the Template namespace (by someone who obviously knew what they were doing) and another most likely by an automated function. The server is still struggling to keep with the edits that took place a while ago, so something must be done in order to prevent this in the future. 

I also proposed some revisions to the Deletion Policy that no one has responded to, so I might as well put it here as well. 

I know this is a lot to think through, but I have been thinking about this for a long time. Recent events have just spurred me to mention it a little bit sooner. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Auto-confirm Age and Count
Proposal:  We could lengthen the current   and   settings to further hinder the ill-intentioned.   is currently set at one day while   is currently nonexistent. I believe it would be best to set   to   (four days) and   to something around 20. And with both of these set, a user would have to fulfill both conditions in order to move into the autoconfirmed group. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:Set   to 4 days and   to 10 edits. –Elliot   02:32, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Creation Protection
Proposal:  I think we should utilize the new feature of Creation Protection. Perhaps this could be a parallel discussion with the Protection Policy, but we will see how it goes. I think that pages deleted via prod (perhaps just DRed) should be protected from creation for a lengthy period (I was thinking along the lines of about 6 months) to ensure that we don't have to waste time dealing with what will eventually end the same. If someone really wanted to create the page, then we could have them establish a copy in their userspace; and if an admin deems in suitable, they will allow them to create it. 

Also, there are :Category:Spam-Blockers|spam blockers that are also made unnecessary due to this feature. I think they should be deleted and indefinitely salted (something WP uses to define creation protection). –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:Add   to the . Salt the rest of the spam-blockers for an indefinite amount of time. And add a note in the protection policy that salting be used at the administrators discretion. –Elliot   11:53, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Deletion Policy - "Contested"
Proposal:  This proposition is fairly small and has to do with the word contested: The deletion review is where pages that are contested or potentially controversial are debated. There have been some pages that are proposed for deletion, with the user who created the page removing the prod. This has been viewed as contested before, but I don't really understand why. It is a natural reaction to contest something that you delete. A recent DR was made after the creator contested the prod, and was the only one who contested it. It went to DR and was (nearly) unanimously chosen for deletion. Defining this word will allow for some quicker actions to be taken on the more obvious terms. And the definition I want is that contested implies a challenge from a third party. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:Nothing to change. Ask the creator of the article to defend his position on the talk and try to reach an agreement. If nothing is worked out, take it to the DR. –Elliot   11:53, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Deletion Policy - Single Active Admin
Proposal:  The addendum proposed by rpeh (seen here) should be implemented into policy, rather than having administrators ask for permission to delete prodded pages after four weeks. There may be times when four weeks pass with a backlog of pages that need deleted. I fail to see how this is even minutely controversial. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:Any administrator wanting to deleting articles that they proposed for deletion must make mention on the Deletion Policy talk page, wait 7 days for no objection, and then delete the articles. –Elliot   02:32, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Edit Filter
Proposal:  Another possible choice would be an Edit filter, which uses regex. There has been some concern over this, but I am just mentioning it as a possibility. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:No use for the edit filter as of now. –Elliot   02:32, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Namespace Protection
Proposal:  My suggestion is that the Template namespace be protected from anonymous editing. I mean, there is essentially no reason for an IP to be editing a template. If it is important, they can simply log in or request an edit be made on the talk page. The simplest way would be to utilize the   feature on the wiki, which also relies on the   setting. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:Templates with 100+ uses should be permanently protected (this would obviously include any templates used on said templates). –Elliot   02:32, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Rate Limits
Proposal:  Another thing we could to is to create a flood control (something often seen on forums), as Ratwar brought to my attention yesterday. We could use the   function in order to place a limit on anonymous and unconfirmed users (maybe like one edit every one or two minutes). We could even use   in order to keep track of people trying to vandalize the site. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:Set   to 20 edits over 6 minutes and implement the Vandal Brake for both administrators and patrollers. –Elliot   11:53, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Rollback
Proposal:  Another possible thing that could be implemented is giving patrollers the rollback right. Now don't freak out and say I am power hungry or something along those lines. I am fine with either result. But if patrollers are going to be fighting vandalism, having the edge over vandals is extremely beneficial. With what patrollers currently have, they can only revert at the same pace people edit. If they had rollback, they can get the upper hand on vandals (since it marks the edit as patrolled as well, so cleanup is pretty easy). But this really isn't my main proposal. –Elliot   19:07, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
 
;Consensus
:No rollback for patrollers; mass rollback for administrators. To use mass rollback, place   in your monobook.js. –Elliot   02:32, 10 December 2009 (UTC)