A sock puppet, sock puppet account, or sock is a false online identity used for deceptive purposes. The term metaphorically refers to a hand puppet made from a sock. Sock puppets might be created by people and organizations to praise, defend, or support themselves, to manipulate public opinion, or to circumvent restrictions such as accessing a resource that a user is blocked from. Sock puppets are unwelcome in many online communities and forums. Generally, a sock puppet dishonestly pretends to be independent from a primary user account, in order to mislead. In contrast, a legitimate pseudonym is sometimes termed an "alt" (short for "alternate" or "alternative") identity or account.
History The practice of writing pseudonymous self-reviews began before the Internet. Writers Walt Whitman and Anthony Burgess wrote pseudonymous reviews of their own books, as did Benjamin Franklin. The Oxford English Dictionary defines the term without reference to the internet, as "a person whose actions are controlled by another; a minion" with a 2000 citation from U.S. News & World Report. Wikipedia has had a long history of problems with sockpuppetry. On October 21, 2013, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) condemned paid advocacy sockpuppeting on Wikipedia and, two days later on October 23, specifically banned Wiki-PR editing of Wikipedia. In August and September 2015, the WMF uncovered another group of sockpuppets belonging to Orangemoody, a collective for undisclosed paid editing.
Types
Block evasion
One reason for sockpuppeting is to circumvent a block, ban, or other form of sanction imposed on the person's original account.
Ballot stuffing Sockpuppets may be created during an online poll to increase the puppeteer's votes. A related usage is the creation of multiple identities, each supporting the puppeteer's views in an argument, attempting to position the puppeteer as representing majority opinion and sideline opposition voices. In the abstract theory of social networks and reputation systems, this is known as a Sybil attack. A sockpuppet-like use of deceptive fake identities is used in stealth marketing. The stealth marketer creates one or more pseudonymous accounts, each claiming to be a different enthusiastic supporter of the sponsor's product, book or ideology. This type of sockpuppets can also be used on review aggregator website like Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes by creating multiple fake accounts to engage in review bombing.
Strawman sockpuppet A strawman sockpuppet (sometimes abbreviated as strawpuppet) is a false flag pseudonym created to make a particular point of view look foolish or unwholesome in order to generate negative sentiment against it. Strawman sockpuppets typically behave in an unintelligent, uninformed, or bigoted manner, advancing "straw man" arguments that their puppeteers can easily refute. The intended effect is to discredit more rational arguments made for the same position. Such sockpuppets behave in a similar manner to Internet trolls. A particular case is the concern troll, a false flag pseudonym created by a user whose actual point of view is opposed to that of the sockpuppet. The concern troll posts in web forums devoted to its declared point of view and attempts to sway the group's actions or opinions while claiming to share their goals, but with professed "concerns". The goal is to sow fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) within the group.
Meatpuppet
Some sources have used the term meatpuppet as a synonym for sock puppet, though meatpuppet is more commonly accepted to be an account that is run by a person other than the puppeteer, yet used to accomplish the same goals as a typical sock puppet.
Investigation of sockpuppetry
A number of techniques have been developed to determine whether accounts are sockpuppets, including comparing the IP addresses of suspected sockpuppets and comparative analysis of the writing style of suspected sockpuppets. Using GeoIP it is possible to look up the IP addresses and locate them.
Legal implications of sockpuppetry in the United States
United States v. Drew
In 2006, Missouri resident Lori Drew created a MySpace account purporting to be operated by a fictitious 16-year-old boy named Josh Evans. He began an online relationship with Megan Meier, a 13-year-old girl who had allegedly been in conflict with Drew's daughter. After "Josh Evans" ended their relationship, Meier later committed suicide. In 2008, Thomas O'Brien, United States Attorney for the Central District of California, charged Drew, then 49, with four felony counts: one count of conspiracy to violate the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), which prohibits "accessing a computer without authorization via interstate commerce", and three counts of violation of the CFAA, alleging she violated MySpace's terms of service by misrepresenting herself. O'Brien justified his prosecution of the case because MySpace's servers were located in his jurisdiction. The jury convicted Drew of three misdemeanor counts, dismissing one on the grounds prosecutors had failed to demonstrate Drew inflicted emotional distress on Meier. During sentencing arguments, prosecutors argued for the maximum sentence for the statute: three years in prison and a fine of $300,000. Drew's lawyers argued her use of a false identity did not constitute unauthorized access to MySpace, citing People v. Donell, a 1973 breach of contract dispute, in which a court of appeals ruled "fraudulently induced consent is consent nonetheless." Judge George H. Wu dismissed the charges before sentencing.
People v. Golb
In 2010, 50-year-old lawyer Raphael Golb was convicted on 30 criminal charges, including identity theft, criminal impersonation, and aggravated harassment, for using multiple sockpuppet accounts to attack and impersonate historians he perceived as rivals of his father, Norman Golb. Golb defended his actions as "satirical hoaxes" protected by free-speech rights. He was disbarred and sentenced to six months in prison, but the sentence was reduced to probation on appeal.
New Directions for Young Adults, Inc. v. Davis
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