Cross posted here as it was highlighted that the individual is a lead Lemmy developer, raising serious concerns about the direction of Lemmy, a leading Fediverse platform, and the impact on future user adoption.

Hi

There have been some rather concerning actions taken by an admin of the !privacy@lemmy.ml community, dessalines@lemmy.ml. Based on recent moderation decisions and a complete lack of communication, it seems like their account may have been compromised, or even more concerning if these actions are deliberate.

  1. Erroneous Rule 4 Enforcement, First Instance: a guide posted to !privacy@lemmy.ml, despite receiving many positive votes and comments, was removed under Rule 4:

If you have a question, please try searching for previous discussions, maybe it has already been answered

However, this post was a guide and not a question, so Rule 4 does not apply. Attempts were made to reach out for clarification but there has been no response, despite their account showing recent activity.

  1. Erroneous Rule 4 Enforcement, Second Instance: an on-topic informational video also posted to !privacy@lemmy.ml, despite also receiving many positive votes, was again removed under Rule 4. This post was again not asking a question, so again Rule 4 does not apply. Again, no explanation has been given.

  2. User Bans in Completely Unrelated Communities: user bans of over a month have been applied for not only !privacy@lemmy.ml but several completely unrelated communities:

This is especially concerning given that the above posts have no relation to these communities, and no recent activity has been made in any of them, meaning none of their rules could have been broken. Moreover, a public track record of positive contributions across Lemmy has been established, with many positive votes and comments received over a sustained period. Given all of this, the bans appear to be highly disproportionate, only adding to the growing concerns around moderation practices.

  1. Repost with Disclaimer Removed: a repost of the guide, despite a disclaimer explaining the original removal appears to be in error and that attempts to contact the admin have failed, despite again receiving many positive votes and constructive comments, was once again removed. Again, no explanation has been given.

Given all of this, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that something is not right. Mistakes in moderation happen but the complete lack of communication, the disproportionate actions, and the ongoing bans from unrelated communities raise serious concerns. It seems as though the account is most likely compromised, or even more concerning if these actions are deliberate.

Has anyone else experienced similar issues with this admin, or does anyone have more insight into what might be happening?

TL;DR: Admin dessalines@lemmy.ml of !privacy@lemmy.ml appears to be making seriously concerning moderation decisions, including erroneous enforcement of Rule 4 in at least two separate instances, failing to respond to messages, and applying user bans in completely unrelated communities despite a long track record of positive contributions across Lemmy. This has led to speculation that their account is likely compromised, or even more concerning if these actions are deliberate.

Any thoughts or similar experiences would be appreciated.

Cross post with https://lemmy.world/post/43944126

    • Zangoose@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      23 hours ago

      There were a few, not exaustive since it’s been a few months since I looked through the source code, some of this might have changed and there’s also a few other checks that I’m forgetting:

      • 4chan screenshots (specifically anything that OCR identified as having “Anonymous #(number)” in it) were banned. Honestly this one is fine as a toggle but I think for a while it was just on by default in the code
      • any community that had specific words in it were blocked at instance level. I think “meme” was there, a few swear words, and a few carryover reddit meme community names (196, I think nottheonion was also there, anything with “shitpost” in the name, etc.)
      • There’s a hidden karma/social credit score based on a user’s interactions and net total karma hidden from them that gets impacted by any moderation actions, including some of the automated hardcoded ones (e.g. even trying to upload an image that gets flagged by the hardcoded checks)
      • users with a low enough net score get shadow-banned without being informed
    • Eldritch@piefed.worldEnglish
      51·
      1 day ago

      There are some disabled by default, filters built into piefed. That the main Dev uses on their instance. It’s not really even remotely the same thing or as controversial. But it’s the closest thing piefed has and gets brought up regularly because of it.

      • Zangoose@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        22 hours ago

        Honestly I would consider hardcoded shadowbanning just as bad.

        Just because I’m closer to agreeing with the PieFed dev’s opinions a little bit more doesn’t mean that I’d support shadow banning someone because the trivially-evaded checks caught a false positive in the crossfire. Piefed’s auto moderation/social scoring is pretty much textbook definition security-by-obscurity. The second anyone knows how it works, it’s useless. It will pretty much exclusively catch people who just wanted to post a harmless meme or something.

        At least (for now) Dessalines isn’t hardcoding his tankie beliefs into Lemmy’s source code.