Fake Trail Markers

Stultusz-INGStultusz-ING Posts: 54 ✭✭✭
edited March 2021 in Invalid Wayspot Appeals

I've spotted yet another suspicious wayfarer activity, which led me to an investigation on another case of vandalism in the name of Wayfarer.

Currently, at least 18+ live Wayspots are fake, and a few more pending/voting in Wayfarer too, with a high chance of becoming live as well.

I highly suggest a more thorough investigation on this abuse, and its perpetrators as it'll most likely turn out more fakes of this kind.

The attack vector is already well known and the portuguese community has spotted at least 3~4 different other cluster instances of this happening.

This does not represent the Wayfarer spirit and, left unchecked and unpunished, will lead to other instances of this happening.

Please take swift, exemplar action against it and its perpetrators.

This is repeated, replicated, intentious, malicious vandalism with the Niantic brand on it. 


The trick is simple: vandalise a trail marker out of its rightful place and plant it as a wandering wayspot.

A few things stood out:

  • Same marker (with same imperfections or dirt marks)
  • No base shown for the markers (probably to make the planting less evident)
  • Wild deviation from the only trail (5+ kilometers)
  • Markers placed behind houses and in the middle of farmland
  • Trail looping back into odd places
  • All of the markers had a custom Street View sphere, with the same author, and didn't show up in the natural google street view (probably they'll remove it one they know of this report)


The clusters of fakes (yellow) versus the official trail (in blue).

EDIT: Three new wayspots went live since I've written this. They are not in the picture below.

Official trail link: http://cm-vilanovadepoiares.pt/images/visitantes/Percursos_Pedestres/folheto_PT_Ribeira_Poiares.pdf



Notice the same "crack" in the top of ALL the markers:


Please do something.

Thanks

Post edited by Stultusz-ING on
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