[HK] You may be kidding: Allowing an Agent to have multiple accs, and spoofing between HK and Taiwan
Related report ref: # 14802592, 14802660, 14806709, 14806804, 14806820, ,14806889, 14807061, 14807072, 14807141, 14807275, 14807283, 15723510, 15723972, 15724022, 15724055, 15724127, 15724131, 15724161, 15724211, 15724221, 15724244
tl;dr: the Group of 13 accounts operate by the same person, is spoofing between HK and Taiwan for at least 3 months.
I write to express my great concern that a group of accounts, which are believed to be controlled by a single person in Pingtung, Taiwan, continuously spoofed between Hong Kong and Taiwan for almost three months!
The group consists of below accounts (in which there might be possibility that more accounts might be controlled by the same person, the list is not exhaustive):
ENL: ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****
RES: ****, ****, ****
Note that these accounts have similar naming pattern (e.g. start with ****/ ****, end with numbers) and they often paired up for their operations.
-------------------
1. The group of accounts first appeared in Chai Wan, Hong Kong on around 7 September 2021. These accounts, at first, capture some unclaimed Portals near Chai Wan Au (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.273269,114.23623&z=17&pll=22.272423,114.235395) in which there were seldom Agents would go. Soon the Portals around these areas were quickly filled to become ENL Level 8 Portals with all Resonators 4belong to the above group of ENL accounts.
These accounts had then raised concerns by both Hong Kong and Taiwan RES Agents, in which Taiwan Agents even commented on the behavior of spoofing and farming in Hong Kong:
(Translation: King happens to "run" to Hong Kong to farm items. So "superb"! And he attacks Portals in Hong Kong!)
Several attempts of reporting the group of Agents through Niantic support was done starting from September 2021. For me, I submitted the reports with ticker numbers below in September 2021:
****- 14802592
****- 14802660
****- 14806709
****- 14806804
****- 14806820
****- 14806889
****- 14807061
****- 14807072
****- 14807141
****- 14807275
Report of multiple accounts operation - 14807283
These reports filed on September, but was quickly replied by your "Lambert" (oh **** is Lambert again without doing appropriate action for these accounts) and the cases were closed.
After two months later, two new ENL accounts and one RES account appeared and trained up to Level 8: ****(ENL), ****(ENL), ****(RES) and they also spoofed between Hong Kong and Taiwan.
-------------------
2. How these accounts spoof.
(i) These accounts operate between Hong Kong and Pingtung, Taiwan. Often they jumped from Hong Kong to Taiwan (and vice versa) around 1-3 days, but some within a shorter time.
Take examples of the logs of **** on 18-19 December 2021:
18 December 2021: 23:45 **** linked Hong Kong Buddhist Cemetery (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.256953,114.233279) to Chaiwan Masjid (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.259313,114.233212)
19 December 2021: 10:24 **** destroyed a Resonator on 水舞間噴水池 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.635105,120.346329)
18:17 **** linked 柏架山引水道C25 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.27387,114.223683) to 派膠器 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.276562,114.226143)
22:00 **** destroyed a Control Field @潮州三和里社區公園 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.556835,120.539618) -1479 MUs
You may see that **** had been travelling between Hong Kong and Kaohsiung, Taiwan and attempted to perform actions in the urban areas of both cities within 24 hours! Owing to COVID-19, given the Quarantine policies in both cities (e.g. https://www.coronavirus.gov.hk/eng/inbound-travel.html), a normal Agent from Taiwan would not be able to travel within Hong Kong before staying in Quarantine hotel for at least 14 days! Thus, from the logical sense, **** would definitely be a spoofer.
Similar instances could be noted for other accounts from time to time, and would be added here for information.
(ii) Spoofing at impossible travel time.
The group of Accounts would spoof in an impossible travel time.
For example, for ****, the account performed actions at around 9-10PM on 7 December 2021 at around the area of https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.259181,114.238546:
You may wish to know that the spoofer performed actions at night jumping from different points of cemetery in Chai Wan, Hong Kong and the residential area outside cemetery, within 20 minutes. There is no public transport at some points of the cemetery. The environment of the cemetery at night is totally dark without lighting facilities. Below is the street view from one of the points in the cemetery for your purview:
Another example by **** on 19 December 2021 also showed ridiculous log that showed the spoofer was without understanding of the geological features between Portals.
18:14 **** deployed a Resonator on 耀東公共圖書館 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.276895,114.225861)
18:17 **** linked 柏架山引水道C25 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.27387,114.223683) to 派膠器 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.276562,114.226143)
Yiu Tung Public Library (the Portal 耀東公共圖書館) is located at the lower part of a hill with altitude of 49m. The Portal 柏架山引水道C25 is located at a location with altitude of 210m. There is no direct vehicular access between two points. The route on foot would require around 50 minutes estimated by Google Maps (https://www.google.com/maps/dir/22.276895,114.225861/22.27387,114.223683/@22.2746367,114.22607,17z/data=!4m6!4m5!1m1!4e1!1m1!4e1!3e2?hl=en) but **** could go within 3 minutes!
-------------------
3. Allowing such actions by the group of these Agents - and your game servers - had been seriously impacting gameplay experience. I wonder if Niantic would take appropriate actions on these accounts given that they had been continuously travelling from HK to Taiwan within a short interval for many many times. I earnestly invite @NianticKK@NianticKK, @NianticThia, @NianticBrian, @NianticCasey@NianticCasey, @halette @halette or other appropriate persons to look into the case and provide us an appropriate reply.
I would also be willing to furnish further information regarding these accounts if anyone wishes.
Comments
they'll just tell you to keep reporting
Living with spoofer becomes a part of agent‘s playing experience🥱
Today I received a reply from Lambert again with standard canned replies for my 10 tickets at 4:01PM HK Time:
Afterwards, I got logs from three spoofing accounts today, namely ****, ****, ****. Here are the logs for your comparison:
****
19/12/2021
10:57PM **** destroyed a Resonator on 潮州-和風彩繪壁畫(https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.55104,120.534169)
20/12/2021
10:01PM **** linked Lion Sculpture (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.26109,114.236268) to Cute Sheep Art (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.260929,114.237981)
Corresponding ticket number: #15734426
****
19/12/2021
10:17AM **** destroyed a Resonator on 獅子園 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.629638,120.348258) -- Kaohsiung, Taiwan
20/12/2021
3:42PM
**** deployed a Resonator on Ngoi Man Street Sitting-Out Area (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.277213,114.226334) -- Hong Kong
Corresponding ticket number: #15734353
Both **** and **** had "bypassed" the Quarantine policy as listed by the Hong Kong Government that all persons from Taiwan should stay in Quarantine Hotel for 14 days; as the account had logs in different areas of Hong Kong just 1-1.5 days from last log from Taiwan, it should logically consider the account was spoofing instead that a real person was in Hong Kong.
****
19/12/2021 23:36 **** destroyed a Resonator on 吾愛佳冬 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.429677,120.525542) -- Kaohsiung, Taiwan
20/12/2021 10:09PM **** deployed a Resonator on Yiu Tung Playground (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.276653,114.225192) -- Hong Kong
10:14PM **** destroyed a Resonator on Mount Parker RSSR Station (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.268371,114.223548)
10:15PM **** destroyed a Resonator on 柏架山天文台雷達三角測量站 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.267951,114.224882)
10:20PM **** deployed a Resonator on 苟延殘喘的兩尾魚 (https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.265483,114.2331)
Impossible travel speed from Yiu Tung Playground to Mount Parker RSSR Station was noted in which it was impossible to travel within 5 minutes. No apparently vehicular access. Estimate by Google Maps is around 1hr and 30 minutes by walk: https://www.google.com/maps/dir/'22.276653,114.225192'/'22.268371,114.223548'/@22.271811,114.2151966,15z/data=!4m13!4m12!1m5!1m1!1s0x0:0x28fc3e387fb2a137!2m2!1d114.225192!2d22.276653!1m5!1m1!1s0x0:0xa4f4aa0ab72cad66!2m2!1d114.223548!2d22.268371
Corresponding ticket numbers: #15733954, #15733980, #15734003
@NianticBrian @NianticKK @NianticThia @NianticCasey @halette can you please follow up the above tickets for your action? Thank you.
Oh, look, just another post about spoofing.
Mark my words, spoofing is the future!
Spoofing needs punishment and it also needs to be prevented. But most of all, it needs to stop being rewarded.
Abuses always go up if nothing is done. What percentage of worldwide gameplay should be spoofing for Niantic to decide to take REAL actions?
The future is spoofing until Niantic fixes it.
Let me add two points:
1. The spoofers had captured Lei Yue Mun Holiday Camp which is currently converted as a Quarantine Centre for COVID-19 from 23 January 2020 onwards (https://www.lcsd.gov.hk/en/camp/p_lymp.php). I wonder why the area in the Holiday Camp (Quarantine Centre) could be entered by spoofers [ENL: ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****, ****; RES: ****, ****, ****] for the Portals around https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=22.278303,114.230944&z=17&pll=22.278212,114.232822
2. Hong Kong had almost the most stringent Quarantine policy all over the world. The Quarantine policy as listed by the Hong Kong Government (https://www.coronavirus.gov.hk/eng/inbound-travel.html) asked that all persons from Taiwan should stay in Quarantine Hotel for at least 14 days (except for persons exempted for special reasons they might stay in home or designated hotel near HK Airport). Apparently, these accounts had "bypassed" the Quarantine policies and considered to be cheating by many agents in Hong Kong and Taiwan. I wonder if Niantic would not ask the "Lambert bot" to send us automatic replies, instead really investigating the matter. Thank you again.
@NianticVK May I know about the reasons of blurring these codenames and removing most of the diagrams captured in Intel?
Today as of this moment spoofers **** **** **** **** **** **** (all ENL accounts)performed actions in the area concerned in this post
@NianticVK again you still mask these accounts without explanation! Can you please don't mask the names of these accounts? You are protecting them instead of handling spoofers!
@NianticVK if you still keep on masking and don't do anything to handle the situation, I will escalate the issue to other player community. Thank you.
Simply the action of them is protecting spoofer and encouraging them.
What a shame 😏
Reacquaint yourself with the player guidelines. https://nianticlabs.com/guidelines/en/
Posting their names here falls under "defame" (and I would argue abuse and harassment, as well). It's up to Niantic to determine what to do with the reports, and what action to take.
Why do I say this? Because I've seen people lose access to comm, and temp banned from the game for a while. It's not worth it to get yourself banned because you wanted to call someone else out for cheating.
Then, no wonder why Niantic is losing players in this game.
Player cheating is a major issue. The spoofer keeps jumping between two places of different countries and 800km apart, daily and sometimes hourly, and played 10 accounts. Yet while I wish to bring out the issue for other players' concern and help reporting together for cheaters, @NianticVK keeps deleting pics from my previous posts to disallow meaningful contributions for the discussions. What a shame.
In addition, please be noted that not only me in sharing those apparently spoofers in the forums. In past, sometimes NIA staffs don't delete codenames, and in one instance, a player got some punishment after his spoofing behaviour was brought in the forum for discussion.
The games been running for over 9 years now. That anyone at all is still playing is a small miracle in and of itself.
The cheaters have been an issue since almost day one, though. You can rise up above what they're doing and be a better player, or you can sink down to their level and play dirty (by breaking the "Treat others with respect" rule), too. Being a better player is more rewarding, in my opinion.
As for someone else being called out for it and it not being moderated in the same way, well again, Niantic does as Niantic pleases. The rules are posted and we all agreed to them when we started playing. Don't break the rules because someone else did. The forums will get nasty if people start doing that constantly.
Far from it be me to be cynical, but I can’t help but seething with indignation when the coward succumbs, or more appropriately, grovels to the spoofers.
There has been a plethora of evidence given by @littlewi and @kamsir (with a bit of luck @NianticVK won’t blur their names) that the mentioned similar-patterned codenames were questionable with their frequent logs that high-key travelled to Hong Kong and Taiwan without quarantine. While the wretched players have already sent thousands of voluminous reports, as detailed as their logs, Google map suggested time of travel, quarantine rules, and other proofs, the Niantic Support made an even more enormous effort in replying to them that - "Yes, we have received them and directly transferred them to the spam box." Dandy!
And now, the despaired-to-be agents manage to stop the interminable unfair gameplay and reports by writing publicly and inviting you to escalate the case. So kind and wonderful are you to show that you have carefully read it by making NO comments and actions but masking the codenames of the spoofers and the Intel screenshots which prove their guilts. Hilarious!
The lesson to be learnt today: we can simply solve the problems by "solving" the ones that raised them.
While I appreciate you all for putting your efforts in and reporting the Agents that are violating the Terms of Service, it'd be much appreciated if this can be reported via In-app support. It's mostly to keep away the 'toxicness'(not sure if this is an actual word), but I hope you all get my point.
Like I mentioned in another thread a while back, cheating is not okay, and please continue reporting such issues via In-app support.
That being said, even though the names are obfuscated, we still will be able to see the names or pictures that were removed by us.
And I'm closing this thread for future comments.
Y'all have a good day!