Wikipedia talk:Spam blacklist

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Where to go to blacklist a malicious link?

It's not precisely spam, but we don't want to link to it. See: Wikipedia:Help_desk#Help deleting a malicious link in a reference list. It's apparently one of those ugly pages that tries to trap your browser. Where do we report this sort to stuff? -Arch dude (talk) 00:13, 10 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Malicious domains would also qualify for blacklisting if they are being added inappropriately. Blacklisting can be requested at MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist (WP:SBL). — Newslinger talk 04:48, 28 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed edit

Note: In this entry, please imagine deleting "XXX", which was added only to allow this entry to be posted.

I encountered the blacklist when I tried to post in the Talk space a link beginning https://youtu.be/ (this is the URL returned when right-clicking in YouTube and selecting "Copy video URL").

The solution, for those encountering this problem, is to change this prefix to "https://www.youtube.com".

I speculate that the reason for blacklisting just the prefix https://youtu.be/ seems to relate to its use as a general URL shortener.

David Spector (talk) 16:33, 1 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

David spector, the solution is explained in the message you encounter when hitting the blacklist, I guess it needs to be duplicated here - there are some other shorteners which should be expanded (one typical one is the google internal shortener for search results).

The youtube shorteners are on there for two reasons: ease of handling blacklisting of specific youtube links (which are spread across the different wikis, no need to leave open the backdoors - spammers and POV pushers are quite insisting, they tend to find ways if you block one), and for quite some time, spambots had a tendency to hammer us with, a.o. youtube shortener links. Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 04:54, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Improving this page

I had never run into the URL blacklist before, so I was surprised that the linked page at Wikipedia:Spam blacklist did not provide any links either (a) to the blacklist itself, so users can see which sites are included (or excluded, I guess); and (b) the reasons for the site being blacklisted.

Wikipedia has always been an exemplar of open policies and digestible, understandable practices, and I hope this page can be improved in that spirit. Woodshed (talk) 03:07, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Woodshed, I am not sure what you mean, there is a link in the first sentence. Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 03:12, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

My apologies Beetstra — if it were a snake, it would've bit me. Though I am, of course, more interested in why the site(s) in question were blacklisted, unless that information is also hiding in plain sight ... ?

I suppose a link to something like this (which took me quite a while to find, FWIW) is what I was looking for. Even that isn't great, though, as the "request" links go to a specific revision and not the correct dated archive ... and there's no equivalent reference for entries on m:Spam blacklist.

Perhaps a search box like the one from m:Talk:Spam_blacklist could be included so interested users can find the discussions. Woodshed (talk) 03:36, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Woodshed, Ah, now I understand, my apologies. The logs are indeed hard to digest. Another part of the problem is that there are about 4 pathways to blacklisting which are all in different locations (direct, you see some users spamming and the link get blacklisted; request at WT:SBL; Autocaught by m:User:LiWa3/user:COIBot and executed from the reports; from WT:WPSPAM).

I could agree that including some search capabilities here would be good. We'll have to fix that. Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 04:47, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Nomenclature given Back Lives Matter

I work in IT & just saw a company email stating that many in the IT world are changing nomenclature to “safe list / block list”. It occurred to me that we should start a discussion about it here, in light of institutional racism. It may be that the underlying etymology was not racist, but I think contemporary usage requires rethinking. Peaceray (talk) 16:18, 24 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Peaceray, the devs are working on it. There are more issues with the naming and I hope the are all solved in one go. Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 19:55, 24 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]