PSA: Trading with bp.tf automatic WILL count towards your trades with scammers on TF2Outpost

[buddhapest]

at bazaar we don't let users trade with our bots unless they pass steamrep checks *and* have a high "score" which consists of checking their profile for number of hours, friends, games owned, and other variables.

 

since fiskie implemented the scoring system at bazaar perhaps he could do the same for automatic.

 

personally i feel like bots are a convenience feature like trade offers and shouldn't be exempt from steamrep/outpost bans.  i use automatic (and love it) but i also use email confirmations.  from there i can check on the user offering before pressing "ok".  some may feel like it defeats the purpose of automatic but nah, 'cause i get the emails on my phone, it makes a specific noise and i can accept or decline from there.

 

remember what's been pointed out several times already.  the point of banning people who trade with scammers - regardless of the methodology - is to make it more difficult for scammers to offload their goods.

 

finally, SCM is a pain in the ass but honestly it's Valve's problem.  we, who are building the economy outside of the SCM have different responsibilities.

[naknak]

The only confusing thing to me is your comment, which mashes together 2 of my replies that have no connection whatsoever. I suggest you read the comments those replies were made to.

You are claiming that Geel is held to the same standard as everyone else when you know that is untrue.

 

Geel and operations similar to his (like tf2wh) are held to a much laxer standard than everyone else.

[Heated Bread]

You are claiming that Geel is held to the same standard as everyone else when you know that is untrue.

 

Geel and operations similar to his (like tf2wh) are held to a much laxer standard than everyone else.

 

Mm.  Yeah they are held to different standards.  If not, they'd have been banned for trading with scammers long ago.

[sirploko]

You are claiming that Geel is held to the same standard as everyone else when you know that is untrue.

 

Geel and operations similar to his (like tf2wh) are held to a much laxer standard than everyone else.

Once you are the owner of a SR affiliated community, it is up to you to follow their standards and rules. As mentioned before, banning geel from Outpost would accomplish absolutely nothing and if you have a problem with how he operates scrap.tf, you need to adress that with Steamrep. We have never received a report about geel personally trading with a scammer, so there's that.

 

Besides that, geel is not even active on Outpost and he certainly does not depend on it for his trading needs. If Steamrep thinks that he has done enough according to their standards, regarding trading with scammers, then it is not our business to tell him otherwise, just as it is nobodies business to tell us how to word and apply our rules.

[Professional Map Painter]

If Steamrep thinks that he has done enough according to their standards, regarding trading with scammers, then it is not our business to tell him otherwise, just as it is nobodies business to tell us how to word and apply our rules.

I'm sure your bosses over at ZAM corp would have differing opinions, but I'm not them. I could however, point out at least one case of an SR affiliate admin trading with scammer(s) that ended with a "slap on the wrist" i.e a verbal warning and no caution/mark.

[naknak]

Once you are the owner of a SR affiliated community, it is up to you to follow their standards and rules.

Again implying there is one set of standards and rules for everyone, when clearly there is not.

 

As mentioned before, banning geel from Outpost would accomplish absolutely nothing

...

Besides that, geel is not even active on Outpost and he certainly does not depend on it for his trading needs.

This is relevant how? Does what the ban would "accomplish" factor into these decisions normally? Another double standard, what a surprise.

 

We have never received a report about geel personally trading with a scammer, so there's that.

In what universe are the scrap.tf bots not alts of his?

 

 

If Steamrep thinks that he has done enough according to their standards, regarding trading with scammers, then it is not our business to tell him otherwise,

Singing a very different tune here than you did in the OP. Again, one standard for Geel and one for everyone else.

 

it is nobodies business to tell us how to word and apply our rules.

Sorry, who started this thread? Who claimed that geel is subject to the same rules as everyone else? If you're in over your head, stick to outpost forums where you can spew this BS and lock the thread when called out.

[♠Derpeh♤]

Once you are the owner of a SR affiliated community, it is up to you to follow their standards and rules. As mentioned before, banning geel from Outpost would accomplish absolutely nothing and if you have a problem with how he operates scrap.tf, you need to adress that with Steamrep. We have never received a report about geel personally trading with a scammer, so there's that.

 

Besides that, geel is not even active on Outpost and he certainly does not depend on it for his trading needs. If Steamrep thinks that he has done enough according to their standards, regarding trading with scammers, then it is not our business to tell him otherwise, just as it is nobodies business to tell us how to word and apply our rules.

Then how is backpack.tf any different, we are an affiliated SR community and as you put it "SR affiliated community, it is up to you to follow their standards and rules."

 

Steamrep hasn't had a problem with automatic when why should outpost come here to a different community and decide to try set their own regulations?

 

It doesn't matter if he uses outpost or not, as of now you clearly condemn automatic while allowing others[geel] to continue doing ssomething worse as scammer salt can easily off load stolen items where as automatic only sells. If you are going to come here with the goal of setting a higher standard you set the standard for everyone not just bp.tf.

 

Atm its basicallay telling users to not use automatic but we will let geel and many other run free. How biased does that sound? I like scrap.tf but there is clearly a double standard.

 

NOTE: As off feb 2015 Automatic

• 153920 completed trades

Of those trades you said you have 5 reports. Those 5 reports are enough to have you regulate what we do and opening our users to be attacked from sinister scammers out of spite... Especially since bp.tf reports and gets many users banned on top of being a community which tries to price items receiving a bulk of the hate form the trading community. A+ for logic. Clearly helping out the community here.

[polar]

We had 2 users that tried to use Automatic as an excuse

 

These were both people selling their hats for pure keys to an obvious scammer alt and not buying hats for keys or trading hats for other hats?

 

And they had logs to prove that the trades were done automatically?

[sirploko]

Again implying there is one set of standards and rules for everyone, when clearly there is not.

 

 

This is relevant how? Does what the ban would "accomplish" factor into these decisions normally? Another double standard, what a surprise.

 

 

In what universe are the scrap.tf bots not alts of his?

 

 

 

Singing a very different tune here than you did in the OP. Again, one standard for Geel and one for everyone else.

 

 

Sorry, who started this thread? Who claimed that geel is subject to the same rules as everyone else? If you're in over your head, stick to outpost forums where you can spew this BS and lock the thread when called out.

You do not understand, it appears, that it is a very big difference between accusing a user of personally trading with a scammer and some diffuse allegations against an entity. If you do have reliable evidence of one or the other, please do file a report with us and we will look into it.

 

There is no double standard about bans, if you can prove to us that such a trade occured, a ban is certainly a distinct possibility. Now ask yourself however if that is what your main grief is about. Do you want geel or any other site owner banned from Outpost for having his bots trade with scammer alts or do you want those services to stop trading with scammer alts alltogether?

 

As far as I am aware there is also Jessecar in the picture, so claiming the bots were his alts and his alone is certainly not correct. And believe it or not, we did never receive a report about the bots either. In THIS universe.

 

I said it once and I will repeat myself one last time:

 

This is not about backpack.tf, this is not about any other community either. This is solely a fair warning, that if you choose to use personal bots that trade for you, your account will be held responsible, as per our rules that have been in place for months the way they are. The reason we made this PSA here, is so the users that use the particular service that had been brought to our attention can inform themselves on the site it originated.

 

If you do not understand, that there is a difference between a SR affiliated community and a single user, that's not my problem. But pointing fingers at the owner of a bot service, without actually going ahead and collecting evidence for these allegations and bringing them to the attention to Steamrep, the community that is the umbrella for all of the other communities regarding scammers, is just plain stupid. The underlying issue you complain about is not that scrap.tf supposedly is trading with scammer alts, but that geel (why not Jessecar?) should be banned from Outpost. Well, I said it above. Go ahead, collect evidence and file a user report on Outpost. We will not apply double standards, but ultimately, no matter the outcome, it will not change the thing you are most butthurt about, that we do not turn a blind eye to your trades with scammer alts, just because you were not manually clicking the buttons to accept.

 

 

Of those trades you said you have 5 reports. Those 5 reports are enough to have you regulate what we do and opening our users to be attacked from sinister scammers out of spite... Especially since bp.tf reports and gets many users banned on top of being a community which tries to price items receiving a bulk of the hate form the trading community. A+ for logic. Clearly helping out the community here.

 

We do not regulate anything you do, that was part of our rules before.  Two users raised the, "I'm innocent, my bot did it" defense and it was decided that we will not accept that.

 

Bot Rule #4:

 

"You are accountable for any trades that your bot makes with known scammers, users with a private profile or items that have been recently scammed. You should be taking as many measures as possible to prevent hijackers and scammers from profiting from their bad deeds. If your bots are found to be accepting scammed goods then you will be punished."

 

Do as you please, trade with whomever you want, but if you don't want to accept Outposts rules, then don't come complaining to us when you get banned. We don't care if other communities choose to turn a blind eye to scammer trades, just because it is more convenient to them or because they don't really care. Over at Outpost, every single one of us cares, that's why we put in all the effort and time and we will not let it go to waste by essentially leaving open a loophole the size of a barndoor.

 

 

 

[naknak]

You do not understand, it appears, that it is a very big difference between accusing a user of personally trading with a scammer and some diffuse allegations against an entity.

A person is an entity. The bots are his alts. No difference there. The only difference is the specificity of the allegations, which in scrap.tf's case are about as "diffuse" as the claim that smoking causes lung cancer. We may not have video of it happening but it's fantastically improbable that scrap.tf has never bought stolen items from an obvious scammer alt. Its checks are simply not exhaustive enough to qualify trading partners to SteapRep's or Outpost's stated standards.

 

A quick look through Scrapendulum's backpack reveals that 10-20% of previous owners could be called "obvious scammer alts."

 

There is no double standard about bans, if you can prove to us that such a trade occured, a ban is certainly a distinct possibility.

A distinct possibility! That's progress. I'll see what I can do.

 

Now ask yourself however if that is what your main grief is about. Do you want geel or any other site owner banned from Outpost for having his bots trade with scammer alts or do you want those services to stop trading with scammer alts alltogether?

I want the same rules for everyone. That includes simple, clear, objective standards for qualifying trading partners. More broadly, I want the concept of "obvious alt" and its laundry list of subjective tests to disappear. If it's not obvious enough to detect it in the steamrep API and auto-tag, then it's not obvious.

 

As far as I am aware there is also Jessecar in the picture, so claiming the bots were his alts and his alone is certainly not correct.

That doesn't reduce either person's responsibility. This is really basic stuff that you already know. It makes them equally and fully responsible.

 

 

If you do not understand, that there is a difference between a SR affiliated community and a single user, that's not my problem.

scrap.tf is not an SR affiliated community. Why? Because they are shady as fuck. Go read their rejected application for details.

[sirploko]

I was under the impression that they were an SR affiliate, my bad for stating that wrong. As for reporting geel (and/or Jessecar):

 

Find an item above the threshold of value, prove that it was traded to or from their bots to a user that is clearly an alt of a scammer and we will treat that report with the utmost dilligence and objectivity. It will most likely not be handled by me or toughsox, since it involves an admin of another community, but it will be looked at and judged according to our rules.

[Дебра]

I was under the impression that they were an SR affiliate, my bad for stating that wrong. As for reporting geel (and/or Jessecar):

 

Find an item above the threshold of value, prove that it was traded to or from their bots to a user that is clearly an alt of a scammer and we will treat that report with the utmost dilligence and objectivity. It will most likely not be handled by me or toughsox, since it involves an admin of another community, but it will be looked at and judged according to our rules.

 

brb logging into a alt :^)

[Milz187]

Oh hi Mister scammer/alt Friend. No, I can't trade with you. Oh, whats that....yea, I can launder your stuff. Give me a moment so I can put keys or whatever on my auto bot. That way I can trade with you and claim I had no involvement. 

 

The reason no one gets away with the excuse "my friend was over my house and I didn't know he scammed while I was AFK" is no different. 

 

Sorry, but you are responsible with what your account does, PERIOD.  If you are thinking using a bot is a loophole, then you have another thing coming.

 

Both Valve and SteamRep have already made this crystal clear. YOU are responsible for anything that happens to with or on your account. 

Lets see if SteamReps tune on this changes after the Mattie incident.

[Milz187]

I was under the impression that they were an SR affiliate, my bad for stating that wrong. As for reporting geel (and/or Jessecar):

 

Find an item above the threshold of value, prove that it was traded to or from their bots to a user that is clearly an alt of a scammer and we will treat that report with the utmost dilligence and objectivity. It will most likely not be handled by me or toughsox, since it involves an admin of another community, but it will be looked at and judged according to our rules.

 

http://forums.steamrep.com/threads/steamrep-scam-report-accused-76561197971691194-mattie.113910/

 

Not sure how I can report this to you but if what you have said is correct you should be banning mattie either that or change the rules.

[sirploko]

http://forums.steamrep.com/threads/steamrep-scam-report-accused-76561197971691194-mattie.113910/

 

Not sure how I can report this to you but if what you have said is correct you should be banning mattie either that or change the rules.

 

Big difference. When a scammer sells something to YOUR bot, you are on the hook. If you buy something from a general purpose bot, which a scammer previously traded there, you are not trading with the scammer at all. If anything, we should ban the owner of the site, not the customers.

 

In contrast to the SCM, there seems to be a method of finding out who the previous owner was, but we have never banned someone for buying an item from someone who is not a scammer (alt), just because the pre- previous owner was a scammer. Au contraire, we always tell the users who bought from the scammer and are about to be banned (if they ask), that they are free to sell the item, as it was effectively 'laundered' by their trade with the scammer.

[Milz187]

Big difference. When a scammer sells something to YOUR bot, you are on the hook. If you buy something from a general purpose bot, which a scammer previously traded there, you are not trading with the scammer at all. If anything, we should ban the owner of the site, not the customers.

 

In contrast to the SCM, there seems to be a method of finding out who the previous owner was, but we have never banned someone for buying an item from someone who is not a scammer (alt), just because the pre- previous owner was a scammer. Au contraire, we always tell the users who bought from the scammer and are about to be banned (if they ask), that they are free to sell the item, as it was effectively 'laundered' by their trade with the scammer.

 

Ok I think I get it, so in regards to the BP.TF automatic bot that bot is owned by the user and not backpack.tf? I put the question mark because I haven't used it.

 

But yeah going off ToughSox comments it seems like it goes both ways, i don't think you should ban either way personally as innocent people just looking to use the bot to sell in a legit means can get caught in the mix.

 

"Both Valve and SteamRep have already made this crystal clear. YOU are responsible for anything that happens to with or on your account."

 

"Oh hi Mister scammer/alt Friend. No, I can't trade with you. Oh, whats that....yea, I can launder your stuff. Give me a moment so I can put keys or whatever on my auto bot. That way I can trade with you and claim I had no involvement."

Reworded

 

"Oh hi Mister scammer/alt Friend. No, I can't trade with you. Oh, whats that....yeah place your items on a bot and I'll buy them and make it look like i had no idea"

[Дебра]

Big difference. When a scammer sells something to YOUR bot, you are on the hook. If you buy something from a general purpose bot, which a scammer previously traded there, you are not trading with the scammer at all. If anything, we should ban the owner of the site, not the customers.

 

There's actually zero difference. OPSkins is a bot service, just like backpack.tf automatic, except it runs the bot on their accounts. It does the exact same thing, sells X for Y with minimal input from you.

Also you still haven't researched backpack.tf automatic, you can't sell to it. You can only sell items with it.

[Milz187]

There's actually zero difference. OPSkins is a bot service, just like backpack.tf automatic, except it runs the bot on their accounts. It does the exact same thing, sells X for Y with minimal input from you.

Also you still haven't researched backpack.tf automatic, you can't sell to it. You can only sell items with it.

 

EDIT: I think he is saying the difference is that the 1 bot is owned by OPSkins and the other is owned by the user as in it goes directly into your account. But yeah I don't see the difference at and if anything OPSkins will benefit scammers much more.

 

In both methods you can move items "in a shifty way"

 

Like even more so through OPSKINS as you can directly give a scammer money through there, and i'm just trying to understand why you will punish one method and not punish the other?

 

I can understand you trying to enforce blocking scammers from profiting but with these cases:

 

System 1: You can give a scammer money, you can also do checks to see who owned the item - But you can't be banned

 

"You can say i want your item to scammer, sell it here please and I will buy it..... end result you now how scammed goods and can sell it on outpost" You are ok with this though?

 

System 2: Scammer has to trade with you are not directly giving them $$$ but instead they have to pay i listed price, I don't see how this will happen more than system 1, there is no prevention you can do besides like listing items - But you can be banned

 

If your going to punish someone for a system at least punish them in the system where they can at least perform checks as apposed to the one where they can't.

imo I don't think it's right to put a blanket rule on either scenario but if your going to blanket ban it it should be in both scenarios especially when scenario 1 benefits the scammer more and you can actually do some checks to help prevent it.

[TRR-O Damon1174]

Oh hi Mister scammer/alt Friend. No, I can't trade with you. Oh, whats that....yea, I can launder your stuff. Give me a moment so I can put keys or whatever on my auto bot. That way I can trade with you and claim I had no involvement. 

 

The reason no one gets away with the excuse "my friend was over my house and I didn't know he scammed while I was AFK" is no different. 

 

Sorry, but you are responsible with what your account does, PERIOD.  If you are thinking using a bot is a loophole, then you have another thing coming.

 

Both Valve and SteamRep have already made this crystal clear. YOU are responsible for anything that happens to with or on your account. 

 

Well hold on a second. We may be responsible, but you guys made backpack.tf automatic for us and it clearly states it wont trade with marked scammers. If we have automatic to help with trades when were offline, then thats great. But, firstly, it'll only accept when they offer our B/O price, which means there's no benefit for them, and secondly, if you guys aren't quick enough to mark a scammer on backpack.tf, then shouldn't that be your fault? And sure, you could say that they werent marked on steamrep so you guys didnt mark them, but doesnt that mean we trade with them unknowingly before they were marked? And even to add to that, putting this rule into motion may make it so we can't cheat and use automatic to trade with scammers, but this could seriously impact the number of people using automatic. And (This has been bought up many times) Why the fuck do people get MARKED for trading with scammers? Caution tag? No. No ban? No. Different punishment? No. Excluding your account from ever being able to trade in the "Acceptable trading community" ever again? You guessed it. and steamreps lazy and bad to, why are we putting THEM in charge of marking people when they take months to respond, and their admins have scammed in the past??? Plus, in the time it takes for them to get marked they could have scammed multiple victims and sold off all their stuf.

 

I'm getting off topic, but I think this rule is bad. Gonna stop using automatic, sorry.

[Woifi The Viking]

-snip

You wont be banned on bp.tf for trading with scammer alts through automatic. Also you wont be banned on steamrep or bp.tf for trades <15 keys with scammers.

[♠Derpeh♤]

Big difference. When a scammer sells something to YOUR bot, you are on the hook. If you buy something from a general purpose bot, which a scammer previously traded there, you are not trading with the scammer at all. If anything, we should ban the owner of the site, not the customers.

 

Erm...what? Your comment shows that you still dont have an understanding of how either of the services work... They are essentially exactly the same except one uses a "proxy".

 

Automatic: You have Item X, List it for a price Y and if a buyer wants your item X they pay Y and they get the item. (Automated selling bot using your account)

OPskins: You have Item X, You trade it to OPBot to list for price Y, if a buyer wants your item X they pay Y and get the item. The money they paid then gets transferred to you. (You trade your item to a automated selling bot to sell for you)

 

They are the exactly the same process only difference is you're using OPskin's account to sell for you instead of your own... And again for automatic which you still seem to have yet to grasp, we can only sell items for a listed price...we cannot buy, i.e. a scammer cannot sell us anything It's a automated selling bot only, it is not a automated buying bot. Which makes banning users for selling an item at b/o who they cannot control (unless they are marked) a very stupid rule. It's like saying we will ban you for if you listed an item on scm and a scammer alt bought that item...

 

EDIT: My apologies if I sound annoyed but after a 9 page thread Im amazed that you still havent understood that automatic is a selling bot and not a buying bot... it is extremely frustrating when outpost mods keep repeating endlessly "what happens when a scammer alts offloads their stolen goods to your bot...etc" which is not even a valid point since automatic cannot buy items but sells items for a b/o. It makes me think that you are just randomly implementing rules on services just because you hear the word "bot" and ignore all else.

 

EDIT2: 

Oh hi Mister scammer/alt Friend. No, I can't trade with you. Oh, whats that....yea, I can launder your stuff. Give me a moment so I can put keys or whatever on my auto bot. That way I can trade with you and claim I had no involvement.

^^^This comment on page one of the thread months ago suggesting that automatic can buy and launder scammed items has been corrected multiple times yet Outpost mods still seem to be repeating this same old invalid argument so for the final time:

 

We can not buy items. Scammers can not sell us anything. We can only sell things for a listed price to those who will pay our listed price.

 

So for the love of god stop endlessly repeating the invalid argument that the automatic can be used to launder stolen goods or that it can be a loop hole for us to buy stolen goods. 

[Taconinja]

So for the love of god stop endlessly repeating the invalid argument that the automatic can be used to launder stolen goods or that it can be a loop hole for us to buy stolen goods.

Autpost l0l

[BankingBot]

http://forums.backpack.tf/index.php?/topic/20204-backpacktf-automatic-help-thread/?p=468721

 

lel, if that's the case i think both mattie and me should be banned. He bought stuff off a scammer which is in his control, i sold stuff to a scammer via automatic though it is not supposed to happen

[Jams]

-snip-

Not trying to necropost, but I decided to look at this thread again and was amused that any of the outpost staff never cared to respond to this.