Banned for commercial spamming?

[Serenity_01]

I was a relatively new member back in late October and went by the username "Shyam09" (http://www.tomshardware.com/community/profile-1792484.htm) and roughly one month later (Nov. 22) I got a PM stating that I was banned by "ex_bubblehead"

I did my research and realized that some bans were permanent while others were temporary. I tried to contact mods to learn more about the reason for the ban since as far as I knew, I wasn't a commercial spammer. But PMs were disabled (perhaps since I was a new member) so the only way to reach out was by creating an account behind a VPN.

I have opened up only three threads on Tom's Hardware:
First
Second
Third

I do realize that spamming on the forums is a big pain, so I do apologize for the inconveniences caused by one of my posts that resulted in so many mod alerts.

Thank you for taking the time to read.

 

[Deleted member 217926]

Hmmm I sure don't see anything that jumps out as spam to me in your posts. I believe maybe you were incorrectly banned due to the system showing some linked accounts that are spammers. Sometimes an innocent account gets caught up in that because our system is not perfect. I apologize for the error and I have unbanned your account. If there is anything else we can do to help don't hesitate to ask!

 

[Pinhedd]

I was a relatively new member back in late October and went by the username "Shyam09" (http://www.tomshardware.com/community/profile-1792484.htm) and roughly one month later (Nov. 22) I got a PM stating that I was banned by "ex_bubblehead"

I did my research and realized that some bans were permanent while others were temporary. I tried to contact mods to learn more about the reason for the ban since as far as I knew, I wasn't a commercial spammer. But PMs were disabled (perhaps since I was a new member) so the only way to reach out was by creating an account behind a VPN.

I have opened up only three threads on Tom's Hardware:
First
Second
Third

I do realize that spamming on the forums is a big pain, so I do apologize for the inconveniences caused by one of my posts that resulted in so many mod alerts.

Thank you for taking the time to read.

I concur with anort3, I do not see anything in your posting history which would explain a ban. I can't go into specifics but it looks to me that barring some other explanation you were unintentionally caught up in a ban wave of spammers. Your profile name "Shyam09" does share some of the characteristics of names used by the bots that love to plague our forums. This has been raised in the moderator's forum for review.

TL'DR: If the ban was in error, our bad!

 

[Wolfshadw]

Hello Serenity_01,

It appears that the username used in the creation of those three threads is, "Shyam09". That username has been associated (normally by IP Address) to several other accounts: "devidmark2323", "devidmarkl2323", and "dfawdfasdf". Each of these accounts are know commercial spamming account. Several of these accounts are also tied (again, likely by IP address) to dozens of other accounts; many of which are also known commercial spamming accounts.

What it appears to be, in my eyes, is that you live on a university campus or some other location that houses an in-house network. However, when you or anyone else (such as these commercial spammers) posts a thread here on Tom's, we only see the one, external IP address from your Internet connection.

In our eyes, we see one person (one IP Address) with dozens of accounts posting to Tom's Hardware. We also see that the vast majority of content being posted from that IP Address is Commercial Spam. At this point, we, at Tom's Hardware, have two options.

1) We continue to try and keep tabs on every single new account that is created from that IP address and see who get's tired first. The Tom's Hardware Moderation Team or the Commercial Spammer.
2) We save hundreds of hours of manpower and simply ban that IP address from which we are getting so much commercial spam.

Obviously, option two is the preferred method, but occasionally, decent and honest posters will also get banned simply by association with that IP address. We regret that this happens, but until we have a better method of blocking commercial spammers, this is the best option we have.

Note: None of the above makes any sense if you're posting this thread from the same location as your previous three threads; at which time, we will need to discuss this with senior mods.

If you have any further questions or concerns, please feel free to post in this thread or Private Message me directly. I will also make sure that the rest of the moderation team is aware of the contents of this thread.

Wolfshadw
Tom's Hardware Moderation Team

 

[Serenity_01]

No worries, it happens. Now that I think about it, I think I was using my university VPN when I created the other account and posted on it. I'll be more cautious next time. Thank you all for being so nice!

 

[Wolfshadw]

Serenity_01 - It looks like, since your account was tied to a number of commercial spammer accounts, it was included in a widespread ban, but it appears the team is trying to restore your "shyam09" account. Please try to post again, using that account. If possible, please report back in this thread whether you are successful or not. If not, we'll take a further look into this issue.

Thank you for your patience in this matter.

Wolfshadw
Tom's Hardware Moderation Team

 

[shyam09]

It's back! Thanks MODs!