https://www.reddit.com/r/modnews/comments/rkyoeq/previewing_upcoming_changes_to_blocking/
created by enthusiastic-potato on 20/12/2021 at 22:15 UTC
451 upvotes, 63 top-level comments (showing 25)
Hey mods, it's your friendly neighborhood potato[1] bringing you the 411 on our latest safety efforts. As of the past few months, the Safety team has been hard at work improving the blocking experience.
1: https://i.redd.it/ozrz1t31sk581.gif
This has involved (1) revamping the current block experience and (2) building a new experience that we have been calling “true block”. True block is an extension of the block feature we currently offer that **prevents users you have blocked from seeing and interacting with your content**. In a few weeks, we plan to announce the roll out and then take the next several weeks after that to actually roll it out. This post is intended to give mods a heads up where we have gone and where we are going.
First, we will cover what changed in improvement #1 - revamping the current block experience. **Previously**, when you blocked someone on Reddit, *you couldn’t see content from the users who you have blocked–but they could see content you have posted*. This allowed bad actors to interact with your posts, comments, and communities without you knowing. It also prevented mods from using the block feature - since filtering out content completely made it impossible to properly moderate. Our most recent changes have addressed this by making sure that content you have blocked is out of the way (i.e. collapsed or hidden behind an interstitial), but still accessible.
In covering improvement #2 - true block, this will be a much more notable change in that, if you block a user, your content looks deleted and archived to them. While building this feature, we have been conducting research and getting feedback from mods in the Reddit Mod Council. One of the most prominent topics of discussion was how and when moderators should be exempt from the true block experience, to better address the discrepancies between blocking and moderation duties. To make sure that you all are properly looped in, we have broken down the true block experience and how it will be customized for mods in the sections below:
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2: https://www.reddit.com/r/modsupport/wiki/report-forms
3: https://reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/4413520308372
4: https://mods.reddithelp.com/hc/en-us/articles/4417201214989
We know this is a big upcoming change, and we want to make sure that you all have a firm understanding of the changes to come. We will stick around to answer questions, concerns, and feedback. Hope to hear from you all, thanks for your time and consideration!
Comment by the_pwd_is_murder at 20/12/2021 at 22:30 UTC
119 upvotes, 7 direct replies
So, if I were creating a spambot account (pure conjecture of course...) the first thing I'd want to do is block all of the anti-bot bots and their operators so they can't see what I'm doing. Is that the new meta? I think that's the new meta.
Comment by uarentme at 21/12/2021 at 00:04 UTC
47 upvotes, 1 direct replies
What's going to happen when users block a mod, and use another community to brigade the mod's community?
The mod won't be able to see the call for the brigade since it's not in their community.
What's going to happen with crossposting?
Will blocked users still be allowed to crosspost content from the person who blocked them to another subreddit? Essentially allowing another vector for harassment?
Comment by Watchful1 at 20/12/2021 at 22:45 UTC
26 upvotes, 1 direct replies
What about messaging? If you try to message someone who has blocked you, do you just get a "this user does not exist" response? Or does it look like the message goes through, but they never receive it?
Comment by [deleted] at 20/12/2021 at 22:35 UTC*
34 upvotes, 3 direct replies
[deleted]
Comment by Isentrope at 20/12/2021 at 22:46 UTC
76 upvotes, 5 direct replies
Is there any concern that this could essentially be used to amplify certain viewpoints using brigades by essentially just true blocking everyone from an opposite point of view? Ordinarily, users do a pretty good job of downvoting and reporting violent comments or outright racism, but couldn't someone theoretically true block a lot of ordinary users and then write some kind of objectionable comment without being downvoted or even reported for it? Eventually there might be a report that moderators could take action against, but it would nevertheless still allow a comment to stay up for a while, in which case the damage would have been done, and it's also possible that no one is ever going to report a comment like that, which makes it a lot harder to effectively moderate.
Would it in any way impact this feature if people were still able to see the comments from the people that blocked them but were unable to interact with them? It seems like determined trolls who want to harass someone would hop on an alt anyways, but allowing all users to see the content would at least give some recourse to folks to report problematic content if need be.
Comment by m0nk_3y_gw at 21/12/2021 at 17:53 UTC*
10 upvotes, 1 direct replies
This limited view of their profile will include their history of posts/comment-- but only in the communities that you moderate. This was a difficult decision for us to make, and one that was influenced by feedback we got on a previous mod call, and ultimately we felt that this was the compromise that best met the privacy needs of users and mods with the contextual needs that mods have.
As a member of a mod council where was the notification this was going to be discussed on a mod call?
This is anti-mod / anti-community.
As a mod how can we tell someone is blocking us? /r/gonewild will need to be updated to auto-ban all sellers trying to block us from viewing their selling activities elsewhere on reddit.
If mods use a non-mod account so they can see what the rest of reddit sees their poster's profile, does that break some new block-evasion rule?
edit: if anyone is blocking any mod from seeing their public activities there should be a sub option to block them from viewing/participating (posting or commenting) any sub that mod account moderates. There's absolutely no reason to make modding on reddit harder / more convoluted than it already is. Reddit is over-run with spam and this helps spammers, not mods.
Comment by MaximilianKohler at 21/12/2021 at 18:45 UTC
11 upvotes, 2 direct replies
This isn't Facebook dude. This is a public website. There are a whole host of problems with this type of "true block". Eg: I could go around spreading lies about /u/spez and spez would never be able to know or respond.
I could also go around spreading lies in general and then block the select people with the knowledge and time to debunk me.
This is yet another moronic change that will contribute to the downfall of reddit.
Comment by tieluohan at 20/12/2021 at 23:35 UTC
10 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Will normal users now be able to reply to modmail messages sent by mods they've blocked? If not, that would allow users to deanonymize modmail messages.
Comment by enthusiastic-potato at 05/01/2022 at 22:18 UTC
1 upvotes, 5 direct replies
Hey all! Thank you for the active conversations and feedback. We have heard your feedback regarding mass blocking, and will be putting additional protections in place to restrict users from manipulating the site or other users’ experiences via block. This has pushed out our expected launch date by ~ 2 weeks. We look forward to sharing more with you all soon.
Comment by userse31 at 21/12/2021 at 11:54 UTC
9 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Blocked user content shows up deleted? Thats not very transparent.
It should really show up with “[blocked]” instead.
Comment by ExcitingishUsername at 20/12/2021 at 22:52 UTC*
23 upvotes, 2 direct replies
One potential avenue of abuse I've seen brought up before is using this to hide harassment, to reduce the likelihood it gets reported; e.g., what happens if, say, Bob leaves nasty comments on a bunch of Alice's posts, then Bob blocks Alice? Will Bob's comments be removed from view of only Alice but still visible to everyone else, or is the system smart enough to remove/hide from everyone any comments an individual has made in reply to a user they later block so as to prevent this type of abuse?
Comment by Wrecksomething at 20/12/2021 at 23:32 UTC
23 upvotes, 2 direct replies
Has the safety team vetted this feature to ensure it won't be a tool for abusing users?
The concern that's usually shared about this is that an abuser could True Block their target, then post about them (misinfo, haranguing, doxxing, etc). The person with the best ability to report that kind of content now can't see it, which prevents timely reporting.
Comment by chaseoes at 20/12/2021 at 22:49 UTC
8 upvotes, 1 direct replies
When viewing the profile of someone who has blocked you, their page will appear as inaccessible.
Does this mean you will be notified that they have blocked you, or will it appear like the profile doesn't exist?
Since you discussed how addressing user profiles was a difficult decision to make, it sounds like you have already anticipated this will be controversial among moderators.
This effectively allows a user to block all of the moderators of a subreddit, that way they can participate without the moderators being able to see their profile history. For example, it could make it harder to identify spam accounts when you're limited to only viewing their history in your subreddit.
My concern is that it doesn't actually stop anyone from viewing their profile - because we could just open it in incognito. It doesn't make much sense to block people from viewing a profile that's inherently public. It's just making it harder and adding an extra step for moderators to get that kind of information.
It does make sense to prevent people they've blocked from interacting with any of their posts or comments, sending PM's, etc. - but I'm just not seeing what effect blocking the profile has when it's a public profile. If a blocked user can't interact with the profile anyway, what is the harm in being able to see it? Since they can just see it anyway if they want to.
So are there any plans in the future to expand user privacy controls where they can set their profile to private or visible only to trusted users? That's the only scenario in which I could imagine this would be needed, to align with those future changes. Otherwise, it's just a red herring for users that have been blocked, not something that has any practical effect on preventing harassment.
Comment by Superbuddhapunk at 21/12/2021 at 10:50 UTC*
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Well it’s very useful to be able to access a user history, not only in the case of brigading but to see overall patterns in behaviour. How can you detect a spammer if you can’t see that they made the same post a gazillion times over multiple subreddits?
Comment by xumun at 21/12/2021 at 01:15 UTC
17 upvotes, 0 direct replies
This will allow users who engage in hate speech, harassment, brigading, disinformation, etc. to fly under the radar by simply blocking the good faith actors who document and report them. A good faith actor would have to switch profiles to even *see* bad faith content (outside the subs they moderate). If you take it further and do this:
We are thinking through how to expand the blocking feature so that we prevent harassment from alts of your blocker.
you will create some sort of dark Reddit. Dark Reddit will be full of dangerous content but the watchdogs will no longer see it. Not to mention that bad faith actors can block archiving services. Their actions will be impossible to document in the future.
This looks like a recipe for disaster to me. Please reconsider this policy! Dark Reddit will make Reddit even more dangerous than it already is.
Comment by ashamed-of-yourself at 20/12/2021 at 22:22 UTC
54 upvotes, 1 direct replies
YES
THANK YOU
FUCKIN’ FINALLY
someone get these admins a fuckin’ Puppers
Comment by erythro at 21/12/2021 at 00:44 UTC
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
this is definitely a good thing for the people who need it, but I can't help but worry it's going to accelerate the social media echo chamber problem even more. So, good for individuals, bad for society. Who knows what the right thing to do is though
Comment by existentialgoof at 17/01/2022 at 09:45 UTC
5 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I have to say, this is a truly terrible idea. If someone doesn't want to interact with me, then that's their prerogative. But why should they be entitled to filter what content that I have access to see? And moreover, what is to stop that user from slandering the people that they've blocked without the blocked user having any recourse?
Comment by Moleculor at 20/01/2022 at 02:59 UTC
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
So I've just discovered that anyone wanting to spread misinformation on Reddit just has to block anyone countering with correct information, and the person can't reply with information correcting/countering the misinformation.
This is a terrible thing/idea.
Comment by skeddles at 20/12/2021 at 23:11 UTC
10 upvotes, 2 direct replies
did you make it so you can block someone without reporting their comment?
Comment by [deleted] at 20/12/2021 at 22:16 UTC
17 upvotes, 1 direct replies
only one exclamation point in the entire post? username does not check out
Comment by MableXeno at 21/12/2021 at 01:54 UTC
4 upvotes, 0 direct replies
How does this impact bots that are moderators on my sub? They would see only content on my sub but not elsewhere? If someone blocks u/OnlyFansBanBot ...the bot will only see content on subs in which they are moderators? This bot does "moderate" in a lot of subs...but not all helper-bots do. And what if it's not moderating where the user is posting OF content?
Comment by Epicduck_ at 21/12/2021 at 04:59 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I’m on a fence about this, one hand it’s a good feature to protect users but on the other hand it can be easily abused. Spam is prominent on Reddit, with tshirt bots flooding subreddits posting to scam websites. What can be done from them taking notice of the users calling them out and blocking them so more people can fall for it?
Blocking could also lead to distrust? (Don’t know what to call it) Where someone could block people who disagree with them, and in future post would appear to have less opposition.
A fix for this would be able to see posts from comments from a person who blocked you in the wild, (comments could be collapsed) but clicking on the profile would lead to an error.
Also getting around a block on most platforms is incredibly easy, making a new Reddit account can take 30 seconds so if someone really wanted to harass you, they could.
Comment by [deleted] at 27/12/2021 at 17:55 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Alts: We are thinking through how to expand the blocking feature so that we prevent harassment from alts of your blocker. Please know that if you find that someone is creating alt accounts to circumvent blocking and continue to harass you - you should report the PMs and/or other abusive messaging.
How about adding another dimension to 'Ban Evasion' whereby if someone evades a site-wide suspension, then they are also evading a ban?
Comment by [deleted] at 20/12/2021 at 22:46 UTC
9 upvotes, 2 direct replies
[deleted]
