Not planned Shadowbanning

[CollinL]

Hello,

If you don't know what shadowbanning is, see this Wikipedia article. I have a few very malicious users on my forum who continue to make alternate accounts (they bypass the mod queue with VPNs) and harass my users and staff. I have tried everything -- even banning the hostnames of their VPNs (with add-ons), but they just keep coming back. I think I could hold them off a lot longer with shadowbanning. There are a lot of reasons why I would like to see shadowbanning implemented, but this is perhaps the most pressing.

I've seen other threads recommending this or an add-on for this, but they never came to fruition.(https://xenforo.com/community/threads/hellbanning.44903/) (https://xenforo.com/community/threads/hellbanning.91645/)

I would really appreciate it if this were implemented and I think it could make banning much more effective. Thank you for your time.

 

[Kintaro]

Great suggestion!!
I'd love to have this.

 

[Digital Doctor]

Are shadowbanned posts visible to guests ?

 

[Mike]

While this is potentially very useful, it's almost impossible to properly manage in our use case so it's unlikely to happen for various technical reasons. Major problems involve the reply counters and last post information, along with our internal approach to post numbering (which is a huge performance benefit).

 

[CollinL]

While this is potentially very useful, it's almost impossible to properly manage in our use case so it's unlikely to happen for various technical reasons. Major problems involve the reply counters and last post information, along with our internal approach to post numbering (which is a huge performance benefit).

Okay. Thanks for the information.

 

[Alpha1]

Now with XF2 out I wonder if shadowbanning would be a possible to implement.
Basically shadowbanning is a global ignore. Tachy goes to Coventry was very useful to have on vbulletin.

I would like to suggest two version of shadowbanning:

1. Shadowban: global ignore & invisible browsing.
2. Advanced Shadowban: content by member is visible to guests and the member only. But content does not come up in newsfeed/new posts/widgets. All content that can be set to private is set to private (albums, profile). Member is set to invisible.

With all the emphasis on dealing with abuse and EU and countries adding laws to regulate it, we need all the tools we can get.

 

[Elizabeth]

Now with XF2 out I wonder if shadowbanning would be a possible to implement.
Basically shadowbanning is a global ignore. Tachy goes to Coventry was very useful to have on vbulletin.

I would like to suggest two version of shadowbanning:

1. Shadowban: global ignore & invisible browsing.
2. Advanced Shadowban: content by member is visible to guests and the member only. But content does not come up in newsfeed/new posts/widgets. All content that can be set to private is set to private (albums, profile). Member is set to invisible.

With all the emphasis on dealing with abuse and EU and countries adding laws to regulate it, we need all the tools we can get.

There is a similar system to the vB one. Called Discouraged. You can see it at the bottom of a profile.

 

[Alpha1]

Discouraged users in XenForo is the same as Miserable Users in vbulletin. This discourages the user with slow response and errors.
Shadowbanning is similar to Tachy goes to Coventry in vbulletin. @Kier made it for vbulletin:

Tachy ran a rival site to mine way back when (don't ask which) and used to frequently lead raiding parties in to my forums to fill them with rubbish. Banning him didn't work, he just registered new accounts, so I needed a way to stop his c*** filling up the forums without him noticing. Hence the feature was born. The 'goes to Coventry' epithet comes from an English expression you can look up on Wikipedia.

Reddit and Twitter took over the concept and implemented Shadowbanning because its so very effective.

 

[Alpha1]

Facebook is implementing shadowbanning for Facebook groups and Instagram.