User:Yunshui/Anti-vandalism for beginners

So you want to revert the vandals? Good for you! Hopefully, this page will help you fight back.

Spotting vandalism

Whilst you may stumble over someone's addition of "wikipedia is gay lol" in the middle of reading an article, there are easier ways of tracking down vandals.

• Use Recent changes (there's a link in your sidebar (← over there), under the Interaction menu). Recent changes shows everything that's happened on Wikipedia in the last few minutes. Most of these edits will be good ones, but every time you update the page, there will (sadly) probably be some vandalism in there somewhere. Look at the edit summary tags; if something is flagged (Tag: possible vandalism) or (Tag: section blanking) then chances are it's not legit. Also, look for IP edits with no edit summary. It's a sad fact that, although IPs are human too, the majority of vandalism on Wikipedia is done by unregistered users. Don't automatically assume that IPs are vandals, though (see below).
• Check the Most vandalised pages list. This only shows changes to articles which have historically high levels of vandalism.
• Check the contribution history of known vandals - if you find they've done it once, they may have done it again.

Make sure it really is vandalism

On Wikipedia, vandalism is very precisely defined as "a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia." Some edits, while they may look like vandalism, are not. Falsely accusing someone of vandalism is considered a personal attack.

• Not all IPs are vandals. In fact, most of them aren't. Don't assume otherwise.
• Things you disagree with are not vandalism. If someone has written, "Foo is ivory," in place of your preferred, "Foo is off-white," discuss the matter on the article talk page, rather than reverting it as vandalism.
• Changing values such as dates, temperatures, quantities or height and weight tags in biographies is not always vandalism (although it usually is). If someone has only changed the value by a small amount, check the source to confirm - they might actually have been making a valid correction. (On the other hand, if someone has changed the Tom Cruise infobox to claim he's 6'8", that's vandalism.)
• Section blanking is not always vandalism (although again, it usually is). Look at what has been removed: if it was unsourced, non-neutral, potentially libellous or highly contentious, the editor may have a good reason for blanking it. Page blanking is different, and is almost always vandalism in article space.
• Poor spelling, grammar and punctuation are not vandalism. Correct them by all means, but much as you may wish to see all users of the Grocer's apostrophe hung by the neck, don't treat the perpetrators as criminals.
• Check the rest of the article - I once embarrassed myself by reverting an edit to Kajukenbo that called it the "Gaylord method" ("gaylord" being British English slang for a homosexual) only to realise moments later that it was developed by Charles Gaylord... Make sure that what looks like a vandal edit genuinely is. If in any doubt, be sure to Google it!
• The rule of thumb: If you're in any doubt, it probably isn't vandalism.

Got a vandal? Revert it!

There are several ways to do this.

• Manual fix Edit the article as usual, find the offending changes, and excise them. You will need to do this if there are subsequent edits that are not vandalism.
• Undo In the article history, choose the most recent diff. It will look something like this:
  

(cur | prev) 08:05, 24 January 2012‎ Yunshui (talk | contribs)‎ (2,384 bytes) (Tag: possible vandalism) (undo)

Choose prev to view the diff. You will now see an option to edit or undo the revision - hitting "undo" will take you to an edit page with the most recent contribution removed. Put "revert vandalism" or something similar in the edit summary, and save the page.

• Revert If there are a string of recent edits adding vandalism to the article, you can't go through and undo them all, and manually fixing will take time. Instead, find the last diff from before the vandalism started, and select it. Now edit the old version (choose "edit" from the Revision as of... line). You will see a warning message; ignore it, add an edit summary to say what you're doing, and save the page. This will overwrite the current (vandalised) version of the article with the old (undamaged) version.

Deal with the user

Don't rest on your laurels once you've fixed the problem. It's important to warn the user of their transgression, for several reasons. Firstly, they may not realise what they were doing is wrong. Secondly, warning them may discourage further vandalism - if they realise they can't get away with it, they may give up. Thirdly, it helps other editors who visit their talk page to see what they've been doing.

• If the editor is new, consider adding a {{Welcome}} template to their talkpage first. They may simply be unaware of our policies. For an IP, you can use {{Welcome-anon-vandal}}.
• Either find the header for the current month, or create it (eg. ==February 2012==). Sorting warnings by month makes it easier to see how consistent the pattern of vandalism is.
• Add the appropriate warning template. In order of severity, there are {{uw-vandal1}}, {{uw-vandal2}}, {{uw-vandal3}} and {{uw-vandal4}}. Choose the next level up from whatever warning is already there, eg. level 1 if there are no previous warnings, level 3 if there are already two warnings on the page. If there has been no vandalism for a while (several weeks), use a level 1 template, especially if dealing with an IP editor.
• If there is already a level 4 warning in place, don't bother adding another. Instead, report the user to Administrator's intervention against vandalism (WP:AIV). Full instructions on filing a report (it's very straightforward) can be found there. An administrator will then review the editor's actions, and implement a block if necessary.
• Before leaving, check the "User contributions" link in your "Toolbox" menu on the left. If the editor has any other recent edits, check to see if they too need reverting.

What next?

If you enjoy fighting vandals and want to do more, there are ways to build upon your anti-vandal work.

• After you become autoconfirmed, activate Twinkle on your account; you can do this under the Gadgets tab of your preferences (just tick the checkbox). Twinkle adds a number of useful anti-vandalism tools, including one-click warning templates and the ability to revert multiple edits. You can learn more about it in this essay.
• If you've done a lot of vandal-fighting, consider applying for rollback rights. This enables you to revert edits faster and more comprehensively. You will need to provide evidence that you need the tool and that you can be trusted with it, so don't bother applying unless you've got at least 50-100 valid reverts under your belt.
• Consider using one of the automated anti-vandal systems provided by the community; STiki, Huggle and Igloo are all popular choices. They run in different ways, but most work by filtering the Recent Changes list and automating the warning process.
• Join the Counter-vandalism unit, a group of editors who specialise in fighting vandalism. The CVU pages, especially the toolkit, are useful resources in the fight to keep Wikipedia clean. The CVU also operates an academy, where you can get training in advanced anti-vandal work from an experienced instructor.