(bots#2) LJ support deny problem
This post is not current - Livejournal are now suspending these journals regularly
More information: Cyrillic russians serial adding friend friending livejournal bot random auto spider
If you are experiencing auto-adding russian bots, please open a support request about it.
LJ Support are denying that they are a problem - so the more they hear about it, the greater the chance that they will actually do something about it.
Take a look at the friends list of the bot that added you - you will notice several people that are either on your friends list, or who belong to a community you are in.
If you can, please contact those people and either tell them what's going on, or direct them to this post.
nympholept
access_commons, daphine_ohmayer and mabel-baskervil appear to be serial adding bots.
They are obviously spidering friend's list and adding one or two people from each.
Can something please be done about this?
---
I'm aware of the procedure for banning users to remove them from your profile,
and i'm aware the support volunteers can't do anything: support volunteers can forward the request to the appropriate people.
LJ support
Thank you for contacting Livejournal and please accept our apologies for the delay with our answer.
We had studied the journals that you reported for unwanted friending, but unfortunately there is nothing that can be done about them as they appear to show no signs of violations (such as being spam bots). It is quite possible that these are just the accounts of new users, who are engaged in serial friend-adding in hopes of gaining some new friends. Since there is no evidence of disrupting activity, there is nothing we can do about these accounts. Unwanted friending in itself is not a violation. The fact that these users had added you to their friends' list does not mean that they will see your "friends-only" entries. If you want to avoid receiving comments from them or don't want to see their usernames in your "friends of" list, you can ban these users (see FAQ - http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=20).
Once again, we are sorry that there is nothing that can be done at this moment, but we hope you understand that we cannot suspend/ban users just for adding other users to their friends list.
nympholept
Why would russian users serial-add english users when they don't even speak english? (I attempted contact)
"The fact that these users had added you to their friends' list does not mean that they will see your "friends-only" entries."
Thanks, I'm not an idiot.
"If you want to avoid receiving comments from them or don't want to see their usernames in your "friends of" list, you can ban these users"
Did you even bother to read my original request?
It says: "I'm aware of the procedure for banning users to remove them from your profile"
LJ supportThank you for contacting Livejournal once again. We understand that you find unwanted friending by these accounts unpleasant, but as we said in our previous letter - it is not a violation of LiveJournal ToS in itself, so we are sorry, no, there is nothing that we can do about this.
We also understand that you know how to use the ban feature and we are sorry that we had reiterated that option for you. The only reason that we mentioned it once again was to let you know that banning users, who had friended you against your will, is a good instrument to remove any reference to them in your profile (in the "friend of" part of it) and to prevent them from ever reaching out to you in your own journal.
Once again, we are sorry that there is nothing else we can do for you at the moment.
LJ supportThank you for contacting us once again, and we are sorry that we upset you by closing this request. This was done because there seemed to be no other questions that you wanted to ask us or that were left unanswered.
It is not true that LiveJournal condones the creation of spam/bot accounts - and we always do take action against accounts that have been proven to be created solely in order to disrupt other users' experience at LJ. However, in studying the accounts that you mentioned we found no visible signs of these being bot accounts, which is why no action is being taken against them at this point. If at a later date we receive any proof that these accounts are really bots or are being used for spamming activities, we will definitely take swift action.
Once again, we hope that the use of existing LiveJournal tools has helped you to reduce your experience with these accounts to a minimum.
More information: Cyrillic russians serial adding friend friending livejournal bot random auto spider
If you are experiencing auto-adding russian bots, please open a support request about it.
LJ Support are denying that they are a problem - so the more they hear about it, the greater the chance that they will actually do something about it.
Take a look at the friends list of the bot that added you - you will notice several people that are either on your friends list, or who belong to a community you are in.
If you can, please contact those people and either tell them what's going on, or direct them to this post.
nympholept
access_commons, daphine_ohmayer and mabel-baskervil appear to be serial adding bots.
They are obviously spidering friend's list and adding one or two people from each.
Can something please be done about this?
---
I'm aware of the procedure for banning users to remove them from your profile,
and i'm aware the support volunteers can't do anything: support volunteers can forward the request to the appropriate people.
LJ support
Thank you for contacting Livejournal and please accept our apologies for the delay with our answer.
We had studied the journals that you reported for unwanted friending, but unfortunately there is nothing that can be done about them as they appear to show no signs of violations (such as being spam bots). It is quite possible that these are just the accounts of new users, who are engaged in serial friend-adding in hopes of gaining some new friends. Since there is no evidence of disrupting activity, there is nothing we can do about these accounts. Unwanted friending in itself is not a violation. The fact that these users had added you to their friends' list does not mean that they will see your "friends-only" entries. If you want to avoid receiving comments from them or don't want to see their usernames in your "friends of" list, you can ban these users (see FAQ - http://www.livejournal.com/support/faqbrowse.bml?faqid=20).
Once again, we are sorry that there is nothing that can be done at this moment, but we hope you understand that we cannot suspend/ban users just for adding other users to their friends list.
nympholept
Why would russian users serial-add english users when they don't even speak english? (I attempted contact)
"The fact that these users had added you to their friends' list does not mean that they will see your "friends-only" entries."
Thanks, I'm not an idiot.
"If you want to avoid receiving comments from them or don't want to see their usernames in your "friends of" list, you can ban these users"
Did you even bother to read my original request?
It says: "I'm aware of the procedure for banning users to remove them from your profile"
LJ supportThank you for contacting Livejournal once again. We understand that you find unwanted friending by these accounts unpleasant, but as we said in our previous letter - it is not a violation of LiveJournal ToS in itself, so we are sorry, no, there is nothing that we can do about this.
We also understand that you know how to use the ban feature and we are sorry that we had reiterated that option for you. The only reason that we mentioned it once again was to let you know that banning users, who had friended you against your will, is a good instrument to remove any reference to them in your profile (in the "friend of" part of it) and to prevent them from ever reaching out to you in your own journal.
Once again, we are sorry that there is nothing else we can do for you at the moment.
LJ supportThank you for contacting us once again, and we are sorry that we upset you by closing this request. This was done because there seemed to be no other questions that you wanted to ask us or that were left unanswered.
It is not true that LiveJournal condones the creation of spam/bot accounts - and we always do take action against accounts that have been proven to be created solely in order to disrupt other users' experience at LJ. However, in studying the accounts that you mentioned we found no visible signs of these being bot accounts, which is why no action is being taken against them at this point. If at a later date we receive any proof that these accounts are really bots or are being used for spamming activities, we will definitely take swift action.
Once again, we hope that the use of existing LiveJournal tools has helped you to reduce your experience with these accounts to a minimum.