Platform Manipulation

Platform Manipulation and Spam Policy

Overview

March 2024

You may not use Kubo Socials services in a manner intended to artificially amplify or suppress information or engage in behavior that manipulates or disrupts peoples experience or platform manipulation defenses on Kubo Social.

We want Kubo Social 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 Kubo Social 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 Kubo Social 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;

coordinated harmful activity that encourages or promotes behavior which violates Our Rules; and

leveraging Kubo Socials open source code to circumvent remediations or platform defenses.

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 Kubo Social accounts or use automation to create Kubo Social accounts.

Accounts tracking when objects in space travel over a specific location on Earth, e.g. New York, Hong Kong

Accounts sharing news about different professional teams in the same sport or league, e.g. NFL, NBA, Premier League

Accounts for personal projects, hobbies/interests, or for your business(es)

Accounts for branded entities specific to unique locations or languages, e.g. brand accounts in English, Spanish and French

In addition, users are allowed to control multiple accounts on behalf of a third-party (e.g. Social Media Managers), provided that no violations of Our Rules (including this policy) occurs.

Kubo Social may approve exceptions to multiple account limits at its discretion.

What is in violation of the Multiple Accounts policy?

You can’t artificially amplify or disrupt conversations through the use of multiple accounts or by coordinating with others to violate Our Rules. This includes:

operating multiple accounts that interact with the same or substantially similar content or Kubo Social account(s) in order to inflate or manipulate the prominence of content and/or accounts; for example:
- Do not create multiple accounts to boost trending topics or hashtags
- Do not create multiple accounts to engage with the same posts, accounts, or polls
- Do not create multiple accounts to misuse the mention/reply feature
- Do not create multiple accounts to boost or amplify one of your own accounts by misusing engagement features (likes, reposts)

operating multiple accounts that post substantially similar or identical content to one another; for example:
- Do not cross-post content across multiple accounts; content that is cross-posted but localized into another language is permitted
- Do not cross-post similar or duplicate content to the same trending topics or hashtags

Employing workarounds to exceed the technical limits of account creation (e.g. account phone number limits)

Multiple accounts that exhibit a pattern or sole purpose of the preceding behaviors may be suspended by Kubo Social. Users operating multiple accounts are still subject to all other Kubo Social Rules, particularly our rules surrounding Platform Manipulation and Spam, and Ban Evasion. Any other violations of Our Rules may also result in all of your accounts being suspended.

Engagement and metrics

You cant artificially inflate your own or others followers or engagement.This includes:

selling/purchasing Post or account metric inflation selling or purchasing followers or engagements (Reposts, Likes, mentions, Kubo Social Poll votes);

apps using or promoting third-party services or apps that claim to add followers or add engagements to Posts;

reciprocal inflation trading or coordinating to exchange follows or Post engagements (including but not limited to participation in follow trains, decks, and Repost for Repost behavior); and

account transfers or sales selling, purchasing, trading, or offering the sale, purchase, or trade of Kubo Social accounts, usernames, or temporary access to Kubo Social accounts.

Misuse of Kubo Social product features

You cant misuse Kubo Social product features to disrupt others experience.This includes:

Posts 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 Posts, or repeatedly sending identical Direct Messages;

repeatedly posting content or sending Direct Messages consisting of links shared without commentary, so that this comprises the bulk of your Post/Direct Message activity; and

Posting an existing phrase or content in a duplicative manner, whether individually or in concert with other accounts. Learn more in our copypasta and duplicate content policy.

Editing Posts

editing Posts to artificially amplify content or deceive people. Examples include, but are not limited to:
- using a Posts existing engagement to amplify substantially different content (e.g. editing a Post from Whats better? Pancakes or waffles? to Thousands of people trust my service. Like my post and subscribe to my channel to get tips on investing)
- editing links (URLs) so that the final destination page has significantly changed, either in content or location (e.g. domain, URL path)
- editing media (e.g. images, videos, audios, gifs, or URLs hosting relevant content) so the Post is meaningfully or entirely different or irrelevant to the previous versions.

Following

follow churn following and then unfollowing large numbers of accounts in an effort to inflate ones 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 accounts followers, particularly using automation.

Engagement

aggressively or automatically engaging with Posts 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

Posting with excessive, unrelated hashtags in a single Post or across multiple Posts.

URLs

publishing or linking to malicious content intended to damage or disrupt another persons browser (malware) or computer or to compromise a persons privacy (phishing); and

posting misleading or deceptive links; e.g., affiliate links and clickjacking links.

Open Source Code

exploiting Kubo Socials open source code, including the logic behind visibility filtering or ML Model training, to circumvent policy enforcement for violations of Our Rules

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 Our Rules; and

operating multiple accounts with distinct identities, purposes, or use cases. These accounts may interact with one another, provided they dont 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 Posts 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 Post from the icon.

Select Its suspicious or spam.

Select the option that best tells us how the Post is suspicious or spreading spam.

Submit your report.

Web

You can report this content via web as follows:

Select Report Post from the icon.

Select Its suspicious or spam.

Select the option that best tells us how the Post is suspicious or spreading spam.

Submit your report.

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

Denylisting URLs

We denylist or provide warnings about URLs we believe to be unsafe.

Limiting the visibility of Posts

Posts which we believe to be in violation of these policies may not appear in certain parts of the Kubo Social product, and/or may not be recommended or amplified by Kubo Social.

Post 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 Posts 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.

Temporary loss of access to Kubo Social features or products

We may temporarily limit or restrict access to Kubo Social features or products, including (but not limited to) Posts, Edit Post, Direct Messages, Spaces, Communities, or Live.

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 Kubo Social is able to reliably attribute to entities known to violate Our Rules.

If you believe that your account was locked or suspended in error, you can submit an appeal.