As you may know, due to excessive misuse of the reputation system, GOG decided to disable downvoting in the forums some time ago. The reality, though, is that this wasn't done properly, and downvoting is still possible. In fact, downvoting bots are still alive and kicking.

Take my account, which is quite recent, as an example. After a few days posting in the forums, my reputation became negative and, since then, continues to decrease. I literally get -1 rep for each and every post I make. Unless an obsessed individual is doing this manually, we're talking about a downvoting bot.

Due to this systematic downvoting, my reputation can only decrease, so reaching the amount of points required to post links is impossible. My account, therefore, is permanently limited.

This situation can only be explained if GOG left a security vulnerability when downvoting was disabled. And, in fact, there is an obvious candidate for this vulnerability in the code (anyone with some knowledge can easily find it using the dev tools of a browser).

I don't think that any responsible company would consider this situation acceptable. Think about it. Would you allow the accounts of your users to become permanently limited by systematic attacks? Would you allow black-hats to control who can or cannot post links in your forums?

If you are from the GOG staff, please look into this. This issue is serious and should be solved ASAP. I think the following two measures are essential:

1) An emergency fix to eliminate the downvoting vulnerability. For example, the server-side code could be changed to prevent reputation points from ever being decremented.

2) A correction of the reputation of each user to compensate for any previous downvotes.

Any thoughts on this? Are you also being downvoted?


Questions and Answers (2023-09-28):

Q1: How can you know so much about GOG's past if your account is so recent?
A1: In the same way a historian knows about the 1800s without being 200 years old: I did my homework. After I figured I was being downvoted, I searched the web for info about GOG's forums to help me understand what was going on. And the best pieces of info came exactly from posts here in the forums.

Q2: Do you have lots of alt accounts?
A2: No, I don't. All accusations against me throughout this thread are plainly false.

Q3: Why did you create this thread after all?
A3: To encourage other users to report similar cases. Additional reports, along with the generated discussion, could attract the attention of GOG staff members and, perhaps, a fix for the downvoting issue could come out as a result.

clearly you are new

gogs infrastructure is built upon very old code, maintained only by patches on top of patches.

theres lots you can do that has been "taken away"

its only a matter of time before they have serious issuess because they have refused to take steps to start a fresh with a solid base

If they can still update the server-side code, eliminating the downvoting issue should be possible, no? And it actually seems to be something simple to do. Are you aware of anything that could prevent them from fixing this?

Expecting GOG to do anything for the forums is a waste of time sadly.

It is extremely fishy here. It looks more like an another alt account by a certain user with a fascinating story.

fva_
ABitAlarmed
reeexium
flewuser
SilentBleppassin
anitmetee

How many of these exist?

Is 7_8 another one?
https://www.gog.com/forum/general/try_currency

I think everyone here can see now what is going on.

Unless GOG fixed that, you can work around this limitation by putting links in quote tags.

You can give it a try by quoting my full message, this link to the best video game of all times should still be included in your answer.

hmmmmmmmmmmm interesting.

You're seeing what you want to see. There is nothing fishy here. And please don't derail this thread.

but yeah, GOG has shown a complete disinterest bordering on malicious unwillingness to handle issues related to the forum, hell the battle to get rid of rep and rep abuse was several years long, so I would expect this exploit to be fixed sometime at minimum in 2063 maybe 2140.

OK. The only forums security breach here is you having tons of alt accounts.

How many alt accounts do have?

What are the names of these accounts?

What is your original account?



And do I get another chat message with a personal attack?

Systematic downvoting from bots, made against all posts created by individuals whom the bot-makers have decided to target, has always been happening, ever since the very first moment when GOG first hid the downvote buttons and the "low rated" text and the users' reputation scores.

This is not "news," and it didn't just start occurring again recently: on the contrary, it's been well-known that it's still been happening right from the start of the time when GOG made some (insignificant, and not good enough) changes to the forum "reputation" system.

The bots have never used clicks on the actual literal "downvote" button in order to register their automatic downvotes; therefore you are right, OP, that this problem is still occurring, since the automatic downvotes from bots are still being registered in exactly the same way as they always were being registered before GOG made any changes to the forum "reputation" system.

The root cause of the problem is GOG's decision to "solve" this problem by way of using a half-baked half-measure, via just hiding the downvote buttons and the "low rated" text, and the users' 'reputation' "scores," rather than to do what GOG should have done, and still needs to do, which is entirely to remove & 100% abolish all aspects of the much-abused "reputation" system from every place in the GOG website, including the coding itself of the website.

Okay, here's what I don't get. Whatever the actual answer is to each of these questions, how does that affect whether or not the complaint in OP is indeed an issue or it isn't? The issue is whether downvoting is still occurring, right? I don't get what any of these questions has to do with that issue.

Whatever is going on here the alt accounts are the true issue here. The sudden silence of the OP speaks for itself. They will be back with a another new account.

Okay, so you're saying definitively that there is no issue with continue downvoting? I'm only asking because I too have wondered a couple of times if it's still happening. So, just to be clear, you're saying it's not an issue forum wide, it's something about this specific account(s)?

I don't know. It could be? From what I read in older threads you need for rep abuse several alt accounts. And now we see someone with tons of alt accounts.

It would be far more interesting if it is possible to figure out what the original account of the OP is. In this case GOG can finally act.