Saidit is currently undergoing the largest DDOS attack we've ever had

submitted by magnora7[A] from (self.SaidIt)

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[–]magnora7[S] 165 insightful - 12 fun165 insightful - 11 fun166 insightful - 12 fun -  (9 children)

Also we're not only being technologically attacked, but culturally attacked as well. Please read this post from /u/Extract and be aware of the full situation regarding these attacks on saidit:

What if I told you, that the last refugee wave was large enough for some propaganda organizations to put this site on their radar?

What if I told you the concern trolls posting those threads/comments are the first wave of shills, whose goal is to slowly corrupt this site the same way most platforms (like many subreddits, in their time) get corrupted? Notice how most of those concern trolls highlight problems that could actually be solved by their own participation - but, that would actually help the site, while their goal is clearly to (slowly) undermine it.

They will also cite the new influx of users as a good thing, and threaten it ends if $demandList isn't met, while in reality much of this activity is artificially created by those shills (not most votes, just the early spike that makes it visible enough for other people to upvote it for the sake of discussion).

This isn't going to stop, by the way - this is only going to get worse the more popular this site gets bigger.

I think some things on the top of the front page these last few days reflect this type of cultural attack, and I think the users of saidit need to be aware that this activity is happening. This is why voat and so many other alternatives have problems with their culture being hijacked by dedicated extremists. It's a deliberate tactic to poison the well, to lower the signal-to-noise ratio and drive others away. People need to be aware that this is a real problem.

[–][deleted] 27 insightful - 2 fun27 insightful - 1 fun28 insightful - 2 fun -  (8 children)

They will also cite the new influx of users as a good thing, and threaten it ends if $demandList isn't met, while in reality much of this activity is artificially created by those shills (not most votes, just the early spike that makes it visible enough for other people to upvote it for the sake of discussion).

This isn't going to stop, by the way - this is only going to get worse the more popular this site gets bigger.

Ironically, giving everyone freedom also gives intelligence agencies and large organizations the opportunity to be deliberately malicious. What can you even do about it? There are no simple answers.

[–]magnora7[S] 27 insightful - 4 fun27 insightful - 3 fun28 insightful - 4 fun -  (7 children)

What can you even do about it?

I think this is the biggest question on the internet right now. No one has solved it, and I'm not sure it's solvable either. But it's clear some approaches are better than others, and I'd like to think saidit's design will help us weather these types of attacks

[–]bobbobbybob 14 insightful - 1 fun14 insightful - 0 fun15 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

being able to block users (from one's personal experience) without needing to engage in pms with them first would let us create comfy silos for ourselves, whilst not changing the site for others

[–]magnora7[S] 13 insightful - 3 fun13 insightful - 2 fun14 insightful - 3 fun -  (5 children)

Yeah that block feature is near the top of our todo list, we also think it's a great idea, but there are programming hurdles that have to be overcome. If anyone wants to help develop such a feature, we'd definitely bring it in to the saidit site code. Here's the open source if anyone is feeling ambitious: https://github.com/libertysoft3/saidit

[–]spinell 5 insightful - 2 fun5 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 2 fun -  (4 children)

what can be done about it

Hi! So Im a member of a huge swedish forum for free speach https://www.flashback.org/ 1.3 million users since 1997, that is often under all sorts of attacks and have to deal with lots of trolls and also authorities and attacks, leaks etc. They have a few admins and lots of mods. The way they dealt with these issues is quite authoritarian and also arbitrary but it kinda works. They made a new rule called quality before quantity. It is only the admin that can enforce, and basicly it means that the admin has the power to remove a post or ban a user completely at his own volition. Obvioulsy people complained and it is rarely used. But admin there is sort of beyond reproach, and highly trusted, and in the end he says "well if you dont like it just leave this is a private forum". Keeps a lot of bs at bay. Just throwing this out there. Good luck with everything.

[–]magnora7[S] 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Thanks for the info. Sounds like an ok system, but a bit arbitrary and up to whims perhaps. I imagine it being in Swedish helps, as there's more shills and propaganda in English I would think. I am envious of that aspect

[–]raslyana 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Monarchy works as long as you have a good monarch. It's the succession that causes the problems.

[–]Marsupial 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

Lol Flashback is racist as fuck and is a huge echochamber where every disagreement is shouted down. It's not possible to discuss anything there that goes againt the forum circlejerk. Flashback is not what Saidit should emulate.

[–]spinell 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

Excuse me?

https://media2.giphy.com/media/d2Z32wTIuPl6iHuw/giphy.gif?cid=82a1493benekc89zebsgwf0gw2yl8vitql49vem4xiyv4hj7&rid=giphy.gif