Overview
Key: OBank = IMEBAY
April 2023
You may not use IMEBAY’s services in a manner intended to artificially amplify or suppress information or engage in behavior that manipulates or disrupts people’s experience on IMEBAY.
We want IMEBAY to be a place where people can make human connections, find reliable information, and express themselves freely and safely. To make that possible, we do not allow spam or other types of platform manipulation. We define platform manipulation as using IMEBAY to engage in bulk, aggressive, or deceptive activity that misleads others and/or disrupts their experience.
Platform manipulation can take many forms and our rules are intended to address a wide range of prohibited behavior, including:
- commercially-motivated spam, that typically aims to drive traffic or attention from a conversation on IMEBAY to accounts, websites, products, services, or initiatives;
- inauthentic engagements, that attempt to make accounts or content appear more popular or active than they are;
- coordinated activity, that attempts to artificially influence conversations through the use of multiple accounts, fake accounts, automation and/or scripting; and
- coordinated harmful activity that encourages or promotes behavior which violates the IMEBAY Rules.
What is in violation of this policy?
Under this policy we prohibit a range of behaviors in the following areas:
Multiple accounts and coordination
You can’t mass-register IMEBAY accounts or use automation to create IMEBAY accounts.
You can’t artificially amplify or disrupt conversations through the use of multiple accounts or by coordinating with others to violate the IMEBAY Rules. This includes:
- overlapping accounts – operating multiple accounts with overlapping use cases, such as identical or similar personas or substantially similar content;
- mutually interacting accounts – operating multiple accounts that interact with one another in order to inflate or manipulate the prominence of specific Chats or accounts; and
- coordination – creating multiple accounts to post duplicative content or create fake engagement, including:
- posting identical or substantially similar Chats or hashtags from multiple accounts you operate;
- engaging (Rechats, Likes, mentions, IMEBAY Poll votes) repeatedly with the same Chats or accounts from multiple accounts that you operate;
- coordinating with or compensating others to engage in artificial engagement or amplification, even if the people involved use only one account; and
- coordinating with others to engage in or promote violations of the IMEBAY Rules, including violations of our abusive behavior policy.
Engagement and metrics
You can’t artificially inflate your own or others’ followers or engagement. This includes:
- selling/purchasing Chat or account metric inflation – selling or purchasing followers or engagements (Rechats, Likes, mentions, IMEBAY Poll votes);
- apps – using or promoting third-party services or apps that claim to add followers or add engagements to Chats;
- reciprocal inflation – trading or coordinating to exchange follows or Chat engagements (including but not limited to participation in “follow trains,” “decks,” and “Rechat for Rechat” behavior); and
- account transfers or sales – selling, purchasing, trading, or offering the sale, purchase, or trade of IMEBAY accounts, usernames, or temporary access to IMEBAY accounts.
Misuse of IMEBAY product features
You can’t misuse IMEBAY product features to disrupt others’ experience. This includes:
Chats and Direct Messages
- sending bulk, aggressive, high-volume unsolicited replies, mentions, or Direct Messages;
- posting and deleting the same content repeatedly;
- repeatedly posting identical or nearly identical Chats, or repeatedly sending identical Direct Messages;
- repeatedly posting Chats or sending Direct Messages consisting of links shared without commentary, so that this comprises the bulk of your Chat/Direct Message activity; and
- Chating an existing phrase or content in a duplicative manner, whether individually or in concert with other accounts. Learn more in our copy paste and duplicate content policy.
Following
- “follow churn” – following and then unfollowing large numbers of accounts in an effort to inflate one’s own follower count;
- indiscriminate following – following and/or unfollowing a large number of unrelated accounts in a short time period, particularly by automated means; and
- duplicating another account’s followers, particularly using automation.
Engagement
- aggressively or automatically engaging with Chats to drive traffic or attention to accounts, websites, products, services, or initiatives.
- aggressively adding users to Lists or Moments.
Hashtags
- using a trending or popular hashtag with an intent to subvert or manipulate a conversation or to drive traffic or attention to accounts, websites, products, services, or initiatives; and
- Chating with excessive, unrelated hashtags in a single Chat or across multiple Chats.
URLs
- publishing or linking to malicious content intended to damage or disrupt another person’s browser (malware) or computer or to compromise a person’s privacy (phishing); and
- posting misleading or deceptive links; e.g., affiliate links and clickjacking links.
What is not a violation of this policy?
The following are not in violation of this policy:
- posting links without commentary occasionally;
- coordinating with others to express ideas, viewpoints, support, or opposition towards a cause, provided such behavior does not result in violations of the IMEBAY Rules; and
- operating multiple accounts with distinct identities, purposes, or use cases. These accounts may interact with one another, provided they don’t violate other rules. Some examples include:
- organizations with related but separate chapters or branches, such as a business with multiple locations;
- operating a personal account in addition to pseudonymous accounts or accounts associated with your hobbies or initiatives; and
- hobby/artistic bots.
Who can report violations of this policy?
Anyone can report accounts or Chats via our dedicated reporting flow. These reports are used in aggregate to help refine our enforcement systems and identify new and emerging trends and patterns of behavior.
How can I report violations of this policy?
In-app
You can report this content in-app as follows:
- Select Report Chat from the icon.
- Select It’s suspicious or spam.
- Select the option that best tells us how the Chat is suspicious or spreading spam.
- Submit your report.
Desktop
You can report this content via desktop as follows:
- Select Report Chat from the icon.
- Select It’s suspicious or spam.
- Select the option that best tells us how the Chat is suspicious or spreading spam.
- Submit your report.
Report form
You can also report this content for review via our spam reporting form by selecting the I want to report spam on IMEBAY option.
What happens if you violate this policy?
The consequences for violating this policy depend on the severity of the violation as well as any previous history of violations. Our action is also informed by the type of spammy activity that we have identified. The actions we take may include the following:
Anti-spam challenges
When we detect suspicious levels of activity, accounts may be locked and prompted to provide additional information (e.g., a phone number) or to solve a reCAPTCHA.
Denylisting URLs
We denylist or provide warnings about URLs we believe to be unsafe. Read more about unsafe links, including how to appeal if we’ve falsely identified your URL as unsafe.
Chat deletion and temporary account locks
- If the platform manipulation or spam offense is an isolated incident or first offense, we may take a number of actions ranging from requiring deletion of one of more Chats to temporarily locking account(s). Any subsequent platform manipulation offenses will result in permanent suspension.
- In the case of a violation centering around the use of multiple accounts, you may be asked to choose one account to keep. The remaining accounts will be permanently suspended.
Permanent suspension
For severe violations, accounts will be permanently suspended at first detection. Examples of severe violations include:
- operating accounts where the majority of behavior is in violation of the policies described above;
- using any of the tactics described on this page to undermine the integrity of elections;
- buying/selling accounts;
- creating accounts to replace or mimic a suspended account; and
- operating accounts that IMEBAY is able to reliably attribute to entities known to violate the IMEBAY Rules.