Country of origin disclosure, for PF posts.

In light of the recent "Russian social media troll farm" news, it would be interesting to see a country flag affixed to every post, based on the IP address of the poster. I, personally, would not have any objection to this. It wouldn't necessarily disclose any personally identifiable information. People can anonymize their IP address if they want to, after all, by using proxies or TOR, etc. But it would be interesting to see, nevertheless.

 

Two or three months ago there were 2 or 3 bloggers from Russia that I exchanged comments with. One described a different
scenario about Russia and Crimea. Interesting

 

The old format showed flags. Another feature lost to progress.

 

Well, the poster could just CHOOSE any flag he wanted on the old forum. My idea would display the flag automatically based on the IP of the poster. Even if they use a proxy or TOR, it would shed some light on where content is being created from. I imagine some posters would be adamantly against this idea, and I have no delusion about it considered for implementation.

 

Nope, that's not gonna happen. Might offend some foreigner and we cant have that.

 

Really? It’s usually Americans getting all hot and bothered about flags.

 

Not this American.

 

I'd say that would be a rule 14 violation.

 

Mebbe there's a relevant field for it in our profiles - I'll check it out when I've posted this . . . yes there is, Location, and Country flag.

 

It is my own experience that members tend to give themselves away by the content of their posts. In the instance you mention I have no doubt whatsoever that someone in Moscow could easily procure a US IP address and show up with a USA flag on their posts. However the content of what they posted would soon make it obvious that they are spreading Russian talking points and disinformation.

Flags are something that scoundrels embrace as a form of camouflage so let's not enable them to pretend to be what they are so obviously not.

 

Just no flags.

 

No, but we can still get their nationality. My Location is on the south coast of England? No flag needed there?

 

Quick survey shows rabid lefties rarely identify their location. No surprise there. Probably a good thing its not mandatory... give them something else to whine about.

 

Ah, good point; I just presumed everyone would enter their nationality as a matter of course. It would be nice to get the flags back as they used to show at a glance in the top R/H corner of the posts though.

 

Russian Trolls are easy to recognize by what they post and would not be found out by a flag...honesty is not their strong point.

 

Wait so you want to censor people?

 

? Not sure how you came to that. But, no.

 

Proxies and VPN's make this pointless.

 

Proxies, vpn's and TOR can all be reliably detected by the end point, and flagged as such. That would be interesting to know as well.

 

I thought using a TOR was against the forum rules.

 

I didn't know that, when I started this thread, but another respondent mentioned it as well. I don't know why they would make such a rule, when simply blocking all TOR exit nodes is trivial, and manual enforcement of the rule would be arduous, and fruitless.

 

A true American isnt bothered by the U.S. flag. Our freedom of speech is a great way to illustrate who our traitors are and also who our disrespectful, ungrateful little pissants who had failures for parents are.

 

You are in no position to talking about true Americans. When you learn what it means you will have begun.

For starters, freedom of speech is not for rooting out traitors. Anyone who thinks beyond the obvious would know that traitors don't announce themselves. You don't even know the meaning of the word.

 

anyone kneeling during our anthem or burning our flag is announcing they are a traitor. Also I never stated that thats what freedom of speech is for.l, you said that. Its a byproduct of free speech.
Also,
traitor:
noun
a person who betrays a friend, country, principle.

when you disrespect the flag, as a fact, you are betraying the country. Would you like the definition of betray? I love discussing words as they are defined. Theres always a lefty who thinks his emotional definition is correct....when we can prove it isnt. Can you tell the forum what your emotional definition of traitor is?

 

The rule was put in place because some people that were abusing the use of TOR and proxy accounts, They would be banned and would crank up another ID using a TOR or proxy account.
Here is a copy of the rule:
14. MULTIPLE USER ACCOUNTS

Multiple user accounts are not allowed. The use of anonymous proxy IP addresses and systems, which are often used to hide identities for the purposes of creating multiple accounts, is also prohibited. Usage of these tools can lead to immediate and permanent banning.