Wikipedia:Counter-Vandalism Unit

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WP:CVU

The Counter-Vandalism Unit (CVU) aims to help in cleaning up vandalism on Wikipedia by producing tools to assist in removing vandalism, providing advice on dealing with vandals, and sharing information with other Wikipedians dealing with the same issues. Removing vandalism is a task open to all members of the Wikipedia community, and the CVU intends to make that task easier. In other words, anyone who wants to help with reverting vandalism is welcome to join.

Identifying with the CVU's role by one of the methods above does not grant you any special rights or privileges on Wikipedia. The CVU is not, and has not requested to be, sanctioned as an official project of the Wikimedia Foundation. It is merely a collection of individuals dedicated to removing vandalism and does not seek to represent itself as anything more. "Unit" is simply a little snappier than "WikiProject".

Contents

Current events

Vandalism
Dealing with vandalism
Obvious vandalism
Long term abuse
Open proxies
Resources & assistance
Counter-vandalism tools
Cleaning up vandalism
Counter-vandalism unit
IP WHOIS tools
Further information
Blocking IP addresses
Vandalism studies
ISP contact information
Do not provoke vandals
 v • d • e 
See also: Wikipedia:Long term abuse

Guidelines and policy

Main article: Wikipedia:Vandalism

If an edit meets the criteria of vandalism, revert it. Please be graceful in doing so and do not bite newcomers. Vandalism should be dealt with using warning templates; if it continues nevertheless, it should be reported directly to the administrators using the links below.

Tools such as blocking and sock puppet reports should not be used as punishment, but rather as prevention against future vandalism. The CVU's purpose is to repair and prevent vandalism, not to punish users, for which being a member of the CVU grants no special authority.

Tools

The following is a list of tools and resources available for those who want to clean up with a more systematic approach.

Screenshot of Wikipedia recent changes IRC feed
Screenshot of Wikipedia recent changes IRC feed

Monitoring

A sample recent changes output
A sample recent changes output

The old school way is to load recent changes and check the (diff) links. If they contain harmful edits, you revert to the previous version. However, the high volume of edits that occur each second makes this difficult to accomplish most of the time, and several tools have been created to simplify the process:

  • VandalProof is an anti-vandalism program for Windows.
  • Vandal Fighter, the original anti-vandalism program, is a Java program that displays the Recent Changes feed from Wikipedia's IRC bots and allows filters to focus on certain types of changes (e.g. anonymous IPs). It also maintains a personal list of trusted users, watched articles, etc.
  • Lupin's Anti-Vandal Tool monitors the RSS feed and flags edits with common vandalism terms. It also has a live spellcheck feature.
  • WikiMonitor is a Windows program that enables users to monitor recent changes, their watchlist, users' contributions, and other feeds in real time as well as providing multiple tools to aid in semi-automated editing and reversion. It is compatible with all Wikimedia wikis.
  • VandalSniper, a VandalProof-like application, is currently in beta. At the moment it has only been confirmed to run on Linux.
  • WikiGuard is a Mac OS X program that monitors the IRC feed and attempts to approximate each edit's risk.
  • RC birds is a Java program that emits different bird sounds for the RC feed depending on the user.
  • The IRC Bot, pgkbot, by Pgk, runs on the IRC channels below.
  • IRC Bots reporting at the #cvn-wp-en channel on the freenode network list suspected vandalism edits (for example: blankings, edits made by blacklisted users, etc.)
  • Young Orphans is a tool made by Interiot to find newly uploaded orphaned images. This is useful for finding various copyright violations and people who are using Wikipedia merely as an image hosting service.
  • ShadowTool is a lightweight RC patrol application for Linux.
  • Mike's Wiki Tool - An RC patrol tool for Windows users.
  • Wikipedia Vandalism Watch is a Windows program that monitors specified users' contributions pages for top edits.
  • Huggle is a Windows program which parses edits from users not on its whitelist. You must be running Windows 2000 / XP / Vista and have .NET 2.0 installed for this program to function.
  • WatchlistBot is an XMPP bot that sends messages in realtime when articles are modified. Users with a Jabber account (note that Google Talk is an XMPP service) can subscribe to the bot and watch both articles and users.

Rollback scripts

Administrators and users who have requested it get a rollback button when looking at diffs in order to revert articles to their previous versions. However, non-administrators and users without the permission can emulate such a button using several tools.

  • RC patrol script gives non-administrators revert, filter, and popup tools while using the (default) monobook skin.
  • Godmode-light is a Javascript program to give non-administrators a rollback button.
  • Navigation popups are a set of utils that appear when hovering over wikilinks. Particularly, hovering over links of old versions provides a "revert" link.
  • Twinkle gives non-administrators (and administrators, for that matter) three types of rollback functions. Other functions include a full library of speedy deletion functions, user warnings, pseudoautomagical reporting of vandals, and more.

Special pages

Task Force

IRC channels

Note that these are not operated by or affiliated with Wikipedia.

Other

Vandalism information

Level 3

Moderate to high level of vandalism. [update]

Huggle is averaging around 12 reversions a minute. Redfarmer (talk) 13:22, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

  • Template:Vandalism information, a tool used as an indication of the current overall level of vandalism that is taking place on Wikipedia. On the page, click the edit button below the vandalism meter to change its level from 5 to 1 and/or add a short comment; 5 indicates very low levels of vandalism, and 1 indicates extremely high. You can add the vandalism information template to your userpage to stay up to date. See Template talk:Vandalism information for different styles.
  • Counter-Vandalism Wiki (Not owned by, operated by, or affiliated with Wikipedia.)
  • Wikilink scripts enable you to double click on [[wikilinks]] within IRC clients. Useful if doing patrol on the IRC channels.
  • There are other scripts that may be handy while doing cleanup (not necessarily vandalism cleanup). Check them at WikiProject User scripts/Scripts (WP:JS)
  • Arnon Chaffin has built a wonderful page made just for vandal fighting and warning.

Recognition

The RickK Anti-Vandalism Barnstar (formerly the Anti-Vandalism Barnstar) may be awarded to those who show great contributions to protecting and reverting attacks of vandalism on Wikipedia. It was introduced on February 27, 2005 by brian0918, and was designed by Deathphoenix. It was renamed on July 24, 2005 in appreciation of the efforts of former Wikipedian RickK in fighting vandalism.

The RickK Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
The RickK Anti-Vandalism Barnstar

Userboxes

Code: Results in:
{{user CUV}}
CUV This user is dedicated to
cleaning up vandalism.
{{user CVU1-en}}
This user is a member of the
Counter-Vandalism Unit.
{{user CVU2-en}}
This user is a member of the
Counter-Vandalism Unit.
{{user CVU3-en}}
The Counter-Vandalism Unit logo This user is a member of the
Counter-Vandalism Unit.
{{user CVU4-en}}
This user fights in open resistance against the forces of the Vandals.
{{user CVU5-en}}
This user fights in the ground forces of Operation Enduring Encyclopedia.

If you prefer not to use userboxes, you can add yourself to Category:Wikipedians in the Counter-Vandalism Unit.

See also