I reported that nazi account from my personal profile as soon as it followed me and when I went into the admin dashboard to process the report, there were already a bunch of others there - gosh you're all fast, and thank you for your part in keeping this instance safe <3

I've suspended the instance as that was the second such account in two days, and I've reached out to the admin to find out what their stance on that kind of content is... >.>

@Curator not sure which user or sites you’re referring to but I’ve just been followed by a user showing nazi flags and ‘hitler’ salutes. I’ve reported and blocked it. Plus one other from the same site

@mat Sounds like the same one, yeah.

Update on ua-fediland.de :

One of their moderators got back to my email. They're in Ukraine and can't moderate during the blackouts (understandably!), and the bots/spammers take advantage of the power outages (they're Russian) to sign up when they know they'll have maximum time to stay on the instance before getting moderated.

I've suggested they might want to close sign ups before the outages to try to prevent it.

Please also see the reply to this toot, however. #Fediblock

@daria Yeah, and they can block IP addresses from the admin panel :) I think they are actively actioning them but only when they can when their power is on

@daria I've asked them ^.^

@Laurie Yeah, there were two accounts doing it and they've both been suspended by that instance now :)

@Curator Thank you for keeping us updated and being understanding of the Ukraine situation! I got the follower in my notifs and thought it was such an odd account to be on that instance o.0

@NAAN Yeah, I suspected it was propaganda.

@Curator that explains all the weird accounts suddenly following me

Though what the hay these bots want I don't know

@vinesnfluff Propaganda, they're Russian bots trying to paint Ukraine in a bad light.

@Laurie
Same... I started blocking suspicious accounts following loads of people (and me for some reason) but not posting. Seems to be a huge influx the last days
@Curator

@Curator they could fix that by approving signups and signing up mods outside ua. They would have no shortage of volunteers. I get their problems but they are the results of unwise choices

@potatogunkelly Yeah, I've offered help and suggested they turn off moderation. Looks from their site that the admin is 18 so I can understand some teething problems (though that doesn't mean the rest of us have to put up with them XD)

@Curator maybe someone elsewhere could take over moderation while they’re having blackouts. I see it’s a .de domain, so possible hosted in Germany? Might make sense to have someone in that time zone do it so that if there is an issue with the hosting provider or domain registrar they can speak to them more easily. Plus less of a language barrier potentially.

@Byte Yeah, I've offered help and suggested they turn off signups while they're having blackouts.

@vulonkaaz Yup :)

@Curator Might be great to post this to #fediblock for all those who blindly blocked the instance.

@stanford Sure, I've chucked the tag in there :)

@Curator Did some of my own investigation before seeing your post, I was getting followed from a bunch of a accounts with no followers. Thanks for the info! https://hachyderm.io/@Timdmackey/109727050194775722

@Timdmackey @Curator I was getting flooded with the same thing and found it very strange and a little alarming. I blocked the whole instance, even though I support Ukraine because all of the new followers from there had 0 posts and 0 followers and weird mastheads with Russian disinfo. Not sure I did right by blocking the whole thing but it was hard to keep up with individual followers.

@Curator I would not be surprised if those blackouts came unannounced.

@chpietsch yeah, probably - would be good for them to disable sign ups until they have a better handle on things

@vulonkaaz I'd suspend them to limit their reach, if you're an instance admin, or if you're not the admin, report them to your instance and block them. Better to not have them around at all. :)

@Curator @daria Please let folks know what they say (if it's not made confidential) - I had the same thought.

I'm not much of a coder, but I can learn how to watch the "entrance" for new accounts acting suspiciously, and our electricity is pretty reliable...

(There has to be people much more qualified than I am, but if not...)

@Curator @daria
You two are lovely.💕
So nice to see.

@MaryMarasKittenBakery @daria

@Curator good to know! I had suspicious follows from there, one with a Nazi flag in profile—I ended up blocking the instance but tomorrow I’ll remove the block. (On my way to bed now.) I’ve gone back to requiring approval of follows.

@azzageddi See the replies I've made to that post too in case that's of further influence :)

@Curator not sure how predictable the blackouts are, but I’m assuming at least some of them are fairly random. If there’s any sort of publicly available indicator of one happening I’d be happy to create(and provide hosting for if needed) some monitoring code that watches that indicator and shuts off signups when a blackout is detected/re-enables when over.

@mgaruccio Aye - see my reply to that thread though, we've kept the block in place for other reasons :(

@Curator Do you recommend individual users block individual accounts then?

@artcollisions Your instance admin hangs out with us in our fedi admins backrooms and so will probably update the blocks on vis.social to reflect this, and meanwhile the instance itself has suspended the bot accounts - but usually the procedure is you'd report any suspect accounts *and* block them (you can block right from the report dialogue after sending a report) while waiting for your instance to action the reports :)

@Curator Thanks! I'm a new mod on my instance, so I'm a little more vested in the answers than a general user. Also, admin is still asleep (I hope!). Stupid time zones. (I did report accounts.)

@artcollisions Oh!! Hi :D In that case, see https://mastodon.art/@Curator/109727445911117353 - and did you want an invite into said backrooms? (It's in Discord) - there are a few mods as well as admins that hang out there :) )

@Curator Yes. I saw that post as well as the reply!!

Ha. I think @kristinHenry has tried to nudge me in that direction. I guess it's time. Thank you! My discord username is artcollisions#2065

@artcollisions @kristinHenry Sent you a friend request from WelshPixie :D

@octofloofy @daria Ah shame! Yeah I can block IPs and email domains from the admin backend (without needing database access - just from the same backend I block instances from)

@Curator 😏

@Curator
You should better not disseminate such statements only because they are made by "a Ukrainian". OUN is rightfully associated wizh nazis, one just has to take a look at Wikipedia, which also refutes the statement about his death in German prison: "Bandera was assassinated in 1959 by KGB agents in Munich, West Germany."

@acka47 I know - I'm sharing it for people to make up their own minds :)

@Curator

🙏 🤗

@Curator That explains a lot. Thanks for the update!

@Curator Lol "hey why dont you just close signups a couple of minutes before they nomb your transmission lines or substations to smithereens, yeah?"

Mate, you need to read more history books.

@otte_homan UA are having scheduled power outages as well as sudden outages from the attacks.