Wikipedia:Vandalism

This page documents an English Wikipedia consensus.

Shortcuts WP:VAND WP:VD WP:VANDAL

This page in a nutshell: Intentionally making abusive edits to Wikipedia will result in bans .

Vandalism
Dealing with vandalism
Obvious vandalism Sockpuppet investigations Long-term abuse reports WikiProject on open proxies
Resources and assistance
Counter-Vandalism Unit Counter Vandalism Academy Cleaning up vandalism Counter-vandalism tools
Further information
Blocking IP addresses Do not insult the vandals CVU Vandalism studies
v t e

Conduct policies
Block evasion Civility Clean start Consensus Dispute resolution Edit warring Editing policy Harassment No personal attacks Ownership of content Sockpuppetry Username policy Vandalism
v t e

On Wikipedia, vandalism has a very specific meaning: editing (or other behavior) deliberately intended to

, which is to create a free encyclopedia, in a variety of languages, presenting the sum of all human knowledge.

The malicious

, and inserting obvious nonsense into a page. Abusive creation or usage of user accounts and IP addresses may also constitute vandalism.

Vandalism is prohibited. While editors are encouraged to warn and educate vandals, warnings are by no means a prerequisite for blocking a vandal (although administrators usually block only when multiple warnings have been issued).

Even if misguided, willfully against

. Choose the template that most closely matches the behavior you are trying to correct.

Types of vandalism

Vandalism on Wikipedia usually falls into one or more of these categories:

Abuse of tags

Bad faith placing of non-content tags such as {{

}} and related tags.

Account creation, malicious

Creating accounts with usernames that contain deliberately offensive or disruptive terms is considered vandalism, whether the account is used or not. For Wikipedia's policy on what is considered inappropriate for a username, see

Wikipedia:Sock puppetry

.

Avoidant vandalism

Removing {{

}} and other related tags in order to conceal deletion candidates or avert deletion of such content. However, this is often mistakenly done by new users who are unfamiliar with AfD procedures and such users should be given the benefit of the doubt and pointed to the proper page to discuss the issue.

Blanking, illegitimate

without any reason, or replacing such content with nonsense. Content removal is not considered to be vandalism when the reason for the removal of the content is readily apparent by examination of the content itself, or where a non-frivolous explanation for the removal of apparently legitimate content is provided, linked to, or referenced in an edit summary.

Blanking that could be legitimate includes blanking all or part of a

}}, as appropriate, should be used as initial warnings for content removals without more descriptive edit summaries.

Repeated uploading of copyrighted material

Uploading or using material on Wikipedia in ways which violate Wikipedia's copyright policies after having been warned is vandalism. Because users may be unaware that the information is copyrighted, or of Wikipedia policies on how such material may and may not be used, such action becomes vandalism only if it continues after the copyrighted nature of the material and relevant policy restricting its use have been communicated to the user.

Edit summary vandalism

Making offensive edit summaries in an attempt to leave a mark that cannot be easily expunged from the record (edit summaries cannot simply be "reverted" and require administrative action if they have to be removed from a page's history). Often combined with malicious account creation.

Format vandalism

Changing the formatting of a page unreasonably and maliciously. But many times, editors might just make an unintended mistake or are testing how the wikicode works. Sometimes it might be a bug in the Wikipedia software. Some changes to the format are not vandalism, but rather either good faith edits of editors who don't know the guidelines or simply a different opinion on how the format should look, in which case it is just a disputed edit.

Gaming the system

Deliberate attempts to circumvent enforcement of Wikipedia policies, guidelines, and procedures by causing bad faith edits to go unnoticed. Includes marking bad faith edits as minor to get less scrutiny, making a minor edit following a bad faith edit so it won't appear on all watchlists, recreating previously deleted bad faith creations under a new title, use of the {{

.

Hidden vandalism

Any form of vandalism that makes use of embedded text, which is not visible to the final rendering of the article but visible during editing. This includes link vandalism, or placing malicious, offensive, or otherwise disruptive or irrelevant messages or spam in hidden comments for editors to see.

Hoaxing vandalism

Deliberately adding falsities to articles, particularly to

, with hoax information is considered vandalism.

Image vandalism

Uploading shock images, inappropriately placing explicit images on pages, or simply using any image in a way that is disruptive. Please note though that Wikipedia is not censored and that explicit images may be uploaded and/or placed on pages for legitimate reasons (that is, if they have encyclopedic value).

Link vandalism

Adding or changing internal or external links on a page to disruptive, irrelevant, or inappropriate targets while disguising them with mislabeling.

Page creation, illegitimate

Creating new pages with the sole intent of malicious behavior. It also includes

, are not vandalism, but frequently happen and often lead to editors being blocked. It's important that people creating inappropriate pages be given appropriate communication; even if they aren't willing to edit within our rules, they are more likely to go away quietly if they understand why their page has been deleted.

Page lengthening, illegitimate

Adding very large (measured by the number of bytes) amounts of bad faith content to a page so as to make the page's load time abnormally long or even make the page impossible to load on some computers without the browser or machine crashing. Adding large amounts of good faith content is not vandalism, though prior to doing so, one should consider if splitting a long page may be appropriate (see Wikipedia:Article size).

Page-move vandalism

Changing the names of pages to disruptive, irrelevant, or otherwise inappropriate names. Only

users can move pages. Because of this, vandals of this variety will often create "sleeper" accounts to gain autoconfirmed status.

Redirect vandalism

Redirecting or changing the target of redirect pages to other pages that are vandalism, nonsense, promotional, non-existent pages, or attack pages. This also applies when a redirect or its title is created only to disparage its subject. Pages that redirect to non-existent or deleted pages are also applied with G8.

Reverting to vandalism

Reverting edits to the latest revisions that are nonsense, promotional, personal attacks, and/or harassment (except for when done by mistake).

Silly vandalism

Adding profanity, graffiti, or patent nonsense to pages; creating nonsensical and obviously unencyclopedic pages, etc. This is one of the most common forms of vandalism. However, the addition of random characters to pages is often characteristic of an editing test and, though impermissible, may not be malicious.

Subtle vandalism

Vandalism that is harder to spot, or that otherwise circumvents detection, including adding plausible misinformation to articles (such as minor alteration of facts or additions of plausible-sounding hoaxes), hiding vandalism (such as by making two bad edits and reverting only one), simultaneously using

in order to give the appearance the vandalism was reverted.

Spam external linking

Adding or continuing to add spam external links is vandalism if the activity continues after a warning. A spam external link is one added to a page mainly for the purpose of promoting a website, product or a user's interests rather than to improve the page editorially.

Talk page vandalism

Illegitimately removing or editing other users' comments, especially in closed discussions, or adding offensive comments. However, it is acceptable to blank comments constituting vandalism,

on the grounds that it would create more issues than it would solve.

Template vandalism

Modifying the wiki language or text of a

to prevent vandalism.

User and user talk page vandalism

Unwelcome, illegitimate edits to another person's user page may be considered vandalism. User pages are regarded as within the control of their respective users and generally should not be edited without the permission of the user to whom they belong. See

.

Vandalbots

A script or "robot" that attempts to vandalize or add spam to a mass of pages.

Although at times the following situations may be referred to colloquially as "vandalism", they are not usually considered vandalism within the context of Wikipedia. However, each case should be treated independently, taking into consideration whether or not the actions violate Wikipedia policies and guidelines. If an editor treats situations which are not clearly vandalism as such, it may harm the encyclopedia by alienating or driving away potential editors.

Boldly editing

Bold edits, though they may precede consensus or be inconsistent with prior consensus, are not vandalism unless other aspects of the edits identify them as vandalism. The Wikipedia community encourages users to be bold and acknowledges

.

Copyright policy violations

Uploading or using material on Wikipedia in violation of Wikipedia's copyright policies is prohibited, but is not vandalism unless the user does so maliciously or fails to heed warnings. It is at least as serious an issue as vandalism and persistent offenders will ultimately get blocked, but it is well worth spending time communicating clearly with those who add copyvio as they are far more likely to reform than vandals or spammers.

Disruptive editing or stubbornness

Some users cannot come to an agreement with others who are willing to talk to them about an editing issue, and repeatedly make changes against consensus. Edit warring is not vandalism and should not be dealt with as such. Dispute resolution may help. See also: Tendentious editing.

Starting a deletion process in bad faith is disruptive editing, but is not vandalism. However, misusing deletion template messages with no intention to start a deletion process is vandalism by abuse of tags.

In short, all vandalism is disruptive editing, but not all disruptive editing is vandalism.

Edit summary omission

The edit summary is important in that it helps other editors understand the purpose of your edit. Though its use is not required, it is strongly recommended, even for minor edits, and is considered proper Wikipedia etiquette. Even a brief edit summary is better than none. However, not leaving edit summaries is not considered vandalism.

Editing tests by experimenting users

Users sometimes edit pages as an experiment. Such edits, while prohibited, are treated differently from vandalism. These users should be warned using the uw-test series of

. Editing tests are considered vandalism only when a user continues to make test edits despite receiving numerous warnings.

Harassment or personal attacks

Personal attacks and harassment are not allowed. While some harassment is also vandalism, such as user page vandalism, or inserting a personal attack into an article, harassment in itself is not vandalism and should be handled differently.

Incorrect

wiki markup and style

Inexperienced users are often unfamiliar with Wikipedia's formatting and grammatical standards, such as how to create internal and/or external links or which words should be bolded or italicized, etc. Rather than label such users as vandals, just explain to them what the standard style would be for the issue at hand, perhaps pointing them towards the documentation at

How to edit a page

, and the like.

Lack of understanding of the purpose of Wikipedia

Some users are not familiar with

or borderline vandalism to experienced users. Although such edits can usually be reverted, it should not be treated as vandalism.

Misinformation, accidental

A user who, in good faith, adds content to an article that is factually inaccurate in the belief that it is accurate, is trying to contribute to and improve Wikipedia, not vandalize it. If you believe inaccurate information has been added to an article in good faith, remove it once you are certain it is inaccurate, and/or discuss its factuality with the user who has added it.

NPOV contraventions

The neutral point of view policy is difficult for many of us to understand. Even Wikipedia veterans occasionally introduce material which is not ideal from an

perspective. Indeed, we are all affected to a greater extent than we estimate by our beliefs. Though the material added may be inappropriate, it is not vandalism in itself.

Nonsense, accidental

While intentionally adding nonsense to a page is a form of vandalism, sometimes honest editors may not have expressed themselves correctly (e.g. there may be an error in the

.

Policy and guideline pages, good faith changes to

Editors are encouraged to be bold. However, making edits to Wikipedia policies and guidelines pages, such as this one, does require some knowledge of the consensus on the issues. If people misjudge consensus, it would not be considered vandalism; rather, it would be an opportunity to discuss the matter with them, and help them understand the consensus.

Reversion or removal of unencyclopedic material

Even

is not vandalism.

Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion, per Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons.

Make sure that the removed content is consistent with Wikipedia's standards before restoring it or treating its removal as vandalism.

Useful ways to detect vandalism include:

• Recent changes patrolling, using the recent changes link with filters to spot suspicious edits
• Keeping an eye on your watchlist
• The
  section blanking
  . Similarly, if an article's size change is inappropriately large for the stated edit summary (e.g. "Fixing typo" while removing 100 bytes), it's an indication of vandalism.

In all the three methods above, examples of suspicious edits are those performed by IP addresses,

.

• See the what links here pages for Insert text, Link title, Headline text, Bold text and Example Image to detect test edits. (See also {{toolbar experiments}}).
• The
  auto-summary feature
  can also help users spot vandalism.
• Viewing the abuse log or this version[1] if the regular abuse log is cluttered by spambots.
• Watching for edits tagged by the abuse filter. However, many tagged edits are legitimate, so they should not be blindly reverted. That is, do not revert without at least reading the edit.
• Plausible, subtle changes not supported by sources or by text elsewhere in the article, particularly without an edit summary, may suggest vandalism. Changing numbers, sometimes by 1, is a common stealth tactic.

Upon discovering vandalism, revert such edits, using the undo function or an anti-vandalism tool. Once the vandalism is undone, warn the vandalizing editor. Notify administrators at the vandalism noticeboard of editors who continue to vandalize after multiple warnings, and administrators should intervene to preserve content and prevent further disruption by blocking such editors. Users whose main or sole purpose is clearly vandalism may be blocked indefinitely without warning.

If you see vandalism on a list of changes (such as your

to determine whether other recent edits by the same or other editors also represent vandalism. Repair all vandalism you can identify.

For a new article, if all versions of the article are pure vandalism, mark it for speedy deletion by tagging it with {{Db-g3}}.

To make vandalism reverts easier you can ask for the rollback feature to be enabled for your registered Wikipedia account. This feature is only for reverting vandalism and other obvious disruption, and lets you revert several recent edits with a single click. See Wikipedia:Requests for permissions.

If you see that a user has added vandalism you may also check their

will then decide whether to block the user.

For repeated vandalism by an

|Name of owner}}. The OrgName on the IP trace result should be used as the Name of owner parameter in the above three templates.

Undetected vandalism

Sometimes vandalism takes place on top of older, undetected vandalism. With undetected vandalism, editors may make edits without realizing the vandalism occurred. This can make it harder to detect and delete the vandalism, which is now hidden among other edits. Sometimes bots try to fix collateral damage and accidentally make things worse. Check the page history to make sure you're reverting to a "clean" version of the page. Alternatively, if you can't tell where the best place is, take your best guess and leave a note on the article's talk page so that someone more familiar with the page can address the issue—or you can manually remove the vandalism without reverting it.

For beginners

For relatively inexperienced Wikipedians, use these simple steps to quickly respond to what you consider vandalism. This is essentially an abridged version of the above page.

1. Assess whether the edit was made in good or bad faith. If in good faith, it is not vandalism as such, so question the accuracy of information on the talk page or add an inline cleanup tag, such as a "{{dubious}}" tag, to the disputed edit. If it is in bad faith, then it is vandalism and you may take the appropriate steps to remove it.
2. Revert the vandalism by viewing the page's history and selecting the most recent version of the page prior to the vandalism. Use an edit summary such as 'rv/v' or 'reverted vandalism' and click on 'Publish changes'.
3. Warn the vandal. Access the vandal's talk page and warn them. A simple note explaining the problem with their editing is sufficient. If desired, a
   series of warning templates
   exist to simplify the process of warning users, but these templates are not required. These templates include
   • Level one: {{subst:uw-vandalism1}} This is a gentle caution regarding unconstructive edits; it encourages new editors to use a sandbox for test edits. This is the mildest warning.
   • Level two: {{subst:uw-vandalism2}} This warning is also fairly mild, though it explicitly uses the word 'vandalism' and links to this Wikipedia policy. It is the first to warn that further disruptive editing or vandalism may lead to a block, however it uses the wording "loss of editing privileges" rather than "block".
   • Level three: {{subst:uw-vandalism3}} This warning is sterner. It is the first to warn that further disruptive editing or vandalism may lead to a block while actually using the word "block".
   • Level four: {{subst:uw-vandalism4}} This is the sharpest vandalism warning template, and indicates that any further disruptive editing may lead to a block without warning.
   • Level four-im: {{subst:uw-vandalism4im}} This warning template should be used only in the worst conditions of vandalism. It indicates that this is the only warning the target will receive, and that further disruptive edits will result in a block without warning.
4. Watch for future vandalism from the vandal by checking the user's contributions. If bad faith edits continue, revert them and warn them again, letting the users know that they can be blocked. Note that it is not necessary to use all four warning templates in succession, nor is it necessary to incrementally step through warnings.
5. Report vandals that continue their behavior after being warned to Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism. While not strictly required, administrators there are most likely to respond rapidly to requests which include at least two warnings, culminating in the level-four "last chance" template.

Template and CSS vandalism

If no vandalizing edits appear in the page's edit history, or the vandalism obscures the page tabs so you can't easily access the history or edit the page, it is probably

vandalism. These are often not difficult to fix, but can be confusing.

To access the page history or edit the page when the "View history" or "Edit" tabs are inaccessible, use

of your browser: it will take the form https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name_of_article?action=edit or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name_of_article?action=history.

If vandalizing edits do not appear in the page history, the vandalism is likely in a

purge

the page.

Image vandalism

, which precludes its addition on any page except those specified.

How not to respond to vandalism

• Do not nominate a page for deletion because it is being vandalized. If a page is persistently vandalized, consider requesting protection of the page at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection.
• two wrongs don't make a right. Instead, report them to the administrators
  if they continue.
• Avoid the word "vandal". In particular, this word should not be used to refer to any contributor in good standing nor to any edits that might have been made in good faith. This is because if the edits were made in good faith, they are not vandalism. Assume good faith yourself; instead of calling the person who made the edits a "vandal", discuss your concerns with them. Comment on the content and substance of the edits, instead of making personal attacks.

Warning templates PageName is optional {{subst:uw-vandalism1|PageName}} ~~~~ (unintentional vandalism/test) {{subst:uw-delete1|PageName}} ~~~~ (unintentional removal of content) {{subst:uw-vandalism2|PageName}} ~~~~ (suitable for intentional nonsense or disruption) {{subst:uw-delete2|PageName}} ~~~~ (variant for removal of content) {{subst:uw-vandalism3|PageName}} ~~~~ ("please stop" for use after level 2 warning) {{subst:uw-delete3|PageName}} ~~~~ (please stop removing content) {{subst:uw-vandalism4|PageName}} ~~~~ (last warning for vandalism) {{subst:uw-delete4|PageName}} ~~~~ (last warning for removing content) {{subst:uw-vandalism4im|PageName}} ~~~~ (only warning; for severe or grotesque vandalism only) {{subst:uw-delete4im|PageName}} ~~~~ (only warning; for many blankings in a short period of time) See additional templates and examples of output

The purpose of warning a user who has vandalized is to inform the user that the user's conduct is abusive and prohibited, and seek the user's compliance. Not all that appears to be vandalism is in bad faith, and a warning can politely advise and correct users unaware of the nature of their actions. A warning may even dissuade a user acting in bad faith from continuing, particularly as the warnings escalate and the user is informed of the consequences of continuing.

Warning a user for vandalism is generally a prerequisite to administrator intervention. Because of this, users should be warned for each and every instance of vandalism.

How to warn vandalizing users

A list of user warning templates, with descriptions and instructions for their use, is at

. In addition to a series of user warning templates for vandalism, there are series for specific types of vandalism. Use the most specific user warning template for the conduct. The existence of these templates is intended as a convenience, and their use is not required. A specifically tailored note, written personally and directly addressing the problematic behavior is equally as acceptable as a form of warning, and in many cases, will often result in better engagement with the user in question.

Assume good faith (such as that the user is simply unaware of the policies and guidelines) unless it is clear that the user is deliberately harming Wikipedia from the outset, for instance in cases of abusive, vulgar, or juvenile vandalism.

If you do choose to use warning templates, please choose templates that are appropriate to the type and level of problem in question. If edits are questionable, but not clearly vandalism, consider using lower-level templates (level 1 or 2) and wait for a few further contributions to see if the other editor responds or changes their behavior. If the behavior continues, or if it is clear the edits are in bad faith from the outset, the use of a higher-level template (level 3 or 4) may be appropriate. If, after receiving multiple warnings, the behavior persists past the point where good faith can be extended, or it becomes clear that the user has had the opportunity to notice they have been warned, and they still persist with the problematic behavior, consider reporting them to

.

Administrator response to vandalism

Response from administrators at the vandalism noticeboard varies depending on the type of vandalism and the specifics of the report. Keep in mind:

• Admins are unlikely to block a user who has not been warned at all, or who has been warned, but has stopped editing since being warned. It must be clear that the user has been told to stop vandalizing, and still persists despite such warnings, except for egregious cases.
• Reports of vandalism from registered accounts are handled differently than that from IP users, and reports from newly registered accounts are handled differently from accounts of experienced Wikipedia users.
  • IP addresses may or may not be kept by the same person for long periods of time; a dynamic address which appears to have stopped vandalizing will probably not be blocked, while one that is actively vandalizing will likely receive a short (1–2 day) block. If there is evidence that an IP address is being used by the same person over a long period of time to repeatedly vandalize Wikipedia, or if it is clear the IP address is being used by multiple people to vandalize Wikipedia (such as a school-based IP, which can sometimes attract lots of juvenile vandalism over long periods of time from many different people) then an administrator may block the IP for a longer time period (several months to a year). IP addresses are almost never blocked indefinitely.
  • Brand-new accounts who repeatedly vandalize despite multiple warnings are usually blocked indefinitely, especially when there is no history of quality editing on the account.
  • Reports which involve experienced Wikipedia users rarely result in blocks for vandalism, as these reports are usually mislabeling other problematic behavior (such as misrepresenting sources, or removing text, or edit warring) as vandalism. The vandalism noticeboard is not designed to litigate disputes or to investigate complex behavior problems. Instead, other noticeboards such as
    the incidents noticeboard
    are more appropriate to deal with those issues.
• Check back in to the vandalism noticeboard to see how your report has been dealt with. If an administrator declines to block someone you report, they will always leave a note explaining why they did not respond as you requested. Often, this does not mean the person you reported is behaving properly, or should not be dealt with, but merely that the mechanisms of the vandalism noticeboard are not well suited for handling many types of reports. Consider taking the issue up at a more appropriate noticeboard, which has been tailored to the specific type of problem you are seeing. Other times, a report is declined for being stale (blocks to abandoned accounts, or to IP addresses which have been dormant for some time are rarely done), or to the admin being unable to easily identify the edits as vandalism.
• If the vandalism in question is "sneaky vandalism", is being committed by a person who was
  WP:AIV
  .

Reminding responding users to correctly warn

Because warnings for vandalism are generally a prerequisite to administrator intervention, it is important that users responding to vandalism warn vandalizing users. To inform responding users of this responsibility, use the user warning template {{uw-warn}}.

Likewise, incorrect use of user warning templates, even if well-intended, should be identified to the mistaken user. The {{

}} series of user warning templates may be used, but a detailed talk page message is better.

The owners of IP addresses can be found using:

• ARIN (North America)
• RIPE NCC (Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia)
• APNIC (Asia Pacific)
• LACNIC (Latin American and Caribbean)
• AfriNIC (Africa)
• IPLigence
• IP-adress.com [sic]
• Find-IP-address.org
• who.is

If an address is not in one registry, it will probably be in another.

Identifying associated IP addresses

If you're trying to determine whether a set of IP addresses involved in vandalism is related, a command-line WHOIS query will generally list this information, or can be shown using the Routeviews DNS name server asn.routeviews.org reverse IP look-up to find the CIDR and ASN for a set of IP addresses. This can be done using IP lookup tools.

A

will typically return NetRange, CIDR, NetName, NetHandle, and OriginAS, all of which identify specific network spaces. Data and labeling vary considerably by WHOIS registrar.

The Routeviews data is far more uniformly structured and returns ASN and CIDR as a reverse-lookup TXT query result. It is more useful and faster than WHOIS when checking multiple IP addresses and can be scripted or automated.

CIDR identifies a set of related addresses ("network space") and ASN identifies an Autonomous System—that is, a single administrative entity with control over multiple (and often very many) addresses. Some (though not all) abuse from multiple sources does come from such unified spaces—possibly corresponding to a set of hosts within a single facility.

Abuse originating in a short period of time from different IP addresses within the same CIDR or ASN may indicate a dedicated non-distributed attack, as opposed to a distributed denial of service attack.

Proxies, VPNs and Tor exit nodes

It's possible that a user's source location is being masked by routing traffic through a

. Such addresses typically serve many, not just one, person, and though they can be valid present challenges when used for abuse.

A proxy VPN is not necessarily detectable, but commercial services may be indicated by the hostname when resolving an IP address.

Users of the Tor anonymity network will show the IP address of a Tor "exit node". Lists of known Tor exit nodes are available from the Tor Project's Tor Bulk Exit List exporting tool.

• Vandalism on Wikipedia
• Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2009-06-22/Vandalism
• User:ClueBot NG – A bot specifically designed for fixing vandalism.

Tools

• rollback
  permission).
• rollback
  permission).
• rollback
  permission).
• userscript
  which allows you to revert vandalism on mobile.
• rollback
  permission).
• Twinkle – JavaScript gadget allowing reversion of vandalism from page diffs.
• rollback
  permissions).

Guidelines

• Administrator intervention against vandalism – intended to get administrator attention for obvious and persistent vandals and spammers
• Cleaning up vandalism – introduction to cleaning up vandalism
• Criteria for speedy deletion – English Wikipedia policy
• Do not create hoaxes – content guideline
• Most vandalized pages – articles that have undergone repeated vandalism - This page is inactive
• Recent changes patrol – Wikipedia communal patrol
• Requests for page protection – for protection against long-term attacks
• Template messages/User talk namespace
   – grid of templates for user talk page warnings and notices
• Vandalism-only accounts – advice for dealing with vandalism from registered accounts
• WikiProject user warnings
   – internal project for creating a complete, standardised set of user warning templates
• WikiProject Vandalism studies
   – internal project for conducting research related to unconstructive edits on Wikipedia (currently semi-active)

Essays

• Avoid the word "vandal" – essay on the differences between vandals and those who make adverse edits
• Deny recognition – essay on not feeding the trolls
• Do not insult the vandals – essay on vandals and civility
• Don't be trigger happy – essay on care, courtesy, and professionalism when performing recent changes and new pages patrols
• Don't call a spade a spade – essay on civility and difficult editors
• Don't template the regulars – essay on how to use warning templates carefully
• Identifying test edits – essay on the difference between editing tests and vandalism
• IP address editors are human too
   – essay on assuming IP address editors are able and willing to make positive contributions
• Make protection requests sparingly – essay recommending not overusing page protection
• Not every IP is a vandal – essay on the common assumption that IP address editors are vandals
• On assuming good faith – essay on the relationship between the Vandalism policy and the Assume good faith behavioral guideline
• The motivation of a vandal – essay on "Why would anyone wish to vandalize a source of information that benefits people?"
• Vandalism is pointless – essay on why vandalism will get you nowhere
• Vandals versus Trolls – essay on the distinction between vandals and trolls
• administrator
  's view

Meta

• m:Anti-vandalism ideas
• m:Vandalbot
• m:What is a troll?
• m:Small Wiki Monitoring Team – cross-wiki anti-vandalism

• Statistics about reverts by bots, Huggle, Twinkle in wmcharts (inactive since 2019)
• "How I Used Lies About a Cartoon to Prove History is Meaningless on the Internet". 15 June 2020.