POI removed incorrectly by someone trying to impersonate my account.

Lakeview Church in Zion is not a school. It has a Sunday school which is acceptable under guidelines. Someone submitted what appears to be a photoshopped image in an attempt to impersonate/**** me and the gym was removed.
It's really disappointing that niantic did not take a moment to verify the information or question the smudge marks at the top of the text in the photo. The POI should be restored and the player (and their associated accounts) should be banned. This clearly violated community guidelines in the games and wayfarer.
https://community.wayfarer.nianticlabs.com/discussion/37192/lakeview-church-also-a-school
Comments
It's rather sad that some players go out their way to commit fraud to get poi's removed.
To add more evidence, I've checked the photo posted in the impersonator's post, and imageedited.com marks it as "probably edited", with "Pixels [that] only match software editors". I imagine it's the text on the bottom half of the photo, which seems suspiciously black and flat compared to the other shadows/dark colors present in the photo.
@NianticLC, seeing as you've commented on the original post, you should probably see this.
Someone more knowledgeable than me could probably analyze the result on FotoForensics and tell what it says as well.
I agree with all of the points mentioned in earlier comments. This removal should be reversed based on the evidence provided.
You should upload some proof. To restore portals that have been reviewed and removed by Wayfarer forum moderators, and to ban abusive Wayfarer users, you need to present something more than a link to a website and let us find by ourselves.
The church website *is* proof - it doesn't have a school. A quick Google search by anyone will also confirm this.
I can also attest that someone is impersonating OP to attempt to remove a waypoint and create problems in the local community. Please look into this.
I’m not sure how it’s come to this, somehow you’ve taken a waypoint I submitted and decided it was a personal attack on you. I promise that’s not the case and I’m sorry it felt that way. Our names are a little similar but I think saying I’m impersonating you is a huge stretch. If it helps my actual name is Sharon (Shari) I worked and lived at belly acher farms in Zion for a big part of my adult life.
I took the photo from my car and promise nothing is photoshopped about it. The sign read to me that they host a grade school inside the church so that’s what I submitted it as. Looking at the link you provided to their site I don’t see anything about a grade school, although it does mention classes k-5 quite a few times and they have a mascot similar to one if expect from a school, but no direct mention of a school in the church. Perhaps there’s a school specific site, or maybe not I’m unsure.
With these concessions I still stand by my request for the stops removal. My photo clearly shows a school is held there. Although the website doesn’t list a school directly reading it and how it mentions k-5 a few times I’d say that’s a reasonable conclusion. To me Not listing a grade school on the website for the church doesn’t discredit the photo evidence.
I’m pretty tender hearted and waking up to have people show me messages from here and different discords saying I was impersonating and photoshopping images and name calling really hurt me.
You actually DID NOT prove your saying that "Someone submitted what appears to be a photoshopped image in an attempt to impersonate me" and "the player (and their associated accounts) should be banned", by simply throwing a link to a website. I did not see anything like impersonation in that post and please upload the real photo from your side to advise how the image was photoshopped.
"Google it, find the truth by yourself and ban players in my favor"? I don't think this works on our earth.
I don't know who you are and if the name is an attack or not, but I know for sure that the photo that you've provided as evidence has been manipulated overwritting the text in the pane.
So anything else that you claim is useless, you've used an edited photo and you try to deny it. Anyone can zoom in on the text and notice it has been added.
Since when has this forum become occupied by "I can attest" and "create problems in the local community" comments without uploading any documents?
I don't know why you "felt sorry that way" when multiple players are claiming that you were illegally uploading photoshopped image for the removal of portals, and thus requesting the ban of your account.
IF you actually did nothing wrong, maybe you could think of taking a video for that scene and do a countercharge. Those players are obviously defaming and att.acking you IF you were not forging the image.
Well, that's your promise against at least one photoshopping detection website... your claim should be ridiculously easy to prove, though. Provide a video for the same sign you've photographed showing the school-related text you claim exists there.
Because I want to believe they just misunderstood my intentions, which happens very frequently online. I don’t want them banned or reprimanded or anything like that. We can disagree on a stop without it getting personal. I wanted to apologize for any misunderstanding on my part but also let them know the language they used here and discord did hurt me. I won’t go back to the stop for additional evidence because I believe my photo is enough. If not and the mods decide against me then I’ll be fine with their decision.
You’re adding nothing of substance to this discussion so I suggest you check your negativity at the door. That being said, Niantic’s knee **** reactions and incompetence when it comes to issues like this is the reason I’m here to help with what’s going on. I don’t take kindly to someone impersonating my friend and causing issues under a similar IGN. There’s no need to justify or provide “proof” to you, this is a Niantic issue. 🙂
The website has NOTHING regarding K-5. The most remote reference to anything of the sort is a Bible Club. Also, where is this Archer Farm in Zion because the only one I know of is the Target brand 🥴
TLDR. Either you got warned/banned for forgery or they got warned/banned for defaming eventually. You give up and you lose, that's all.
The reason why I make replies is that I see multiple players trying to ban your account and accuse you of impersonation without sufficient evidence FOR NOW. not that I support your removal post or your image. I don't think that they have monopolised the use of "shari" in the codename. And it's ridiculous to say that someone impersonated another player to remove the portal because it won't affect the decision of removal at all, on the premise that that player is not the owner of a single-family home. The logic presented in this thread is questionable.
I don't see it as a good phenomenon in this forum. Isn't it easy to prove that the image of a portal or its surroundings has been edited? Just go there and take a photo of the real structure. Why not taking one? He who claims shall bear the proof. Or, if there is actually no structure like that, scan results generated by multiple photoshopping detection websites can also testify to some extent. Those website would generally show which part of the image is suspicious. Why not uploading some?
Throwing negative comments in group but not uploading any photos/videos/streetviews/scan results looks like pure witch hunting.
No.
https://lvchurch.org/adventure-club-registration/
https://lvchurch.org/vbs-registration/
Both mentioned "Grade as of September 2022 (K-5 only)".
And it's also sad that some players ignore the community guideline and procedural justice, and is firmly reluctant to present toilless due document when proving "there is a fraud". Leaving this thread full of emotional comments but not evidence.
Guess what would it lead to if everyone ignores the community guideline and procedure? For example, this time OP raised a link to a website as reference and thinks that it's sufficient as evidence to "pronounce sentence of violation of a specific player". In the future, abusive Wayspot users can also register a domain by themselves, make a copycat but modified site of an organization and claim that a previously done, specific valid appeal "is a fraud", because "the website did not mention XXX,YYY or ZZZ" and ask the admins to ban a good player. Does this sound good? That's why we need photos, videos on scene.
Zoom in and you'll easily notice that the text has been added on the photo.
If the text was actually added to the photo, it means that there is exactly a guideboard/sign shown in the photo without texts or with different texts.
A genuine photo of that guideboard would be better than any emotional comments here in this thread. And this is the only proof that I think Niantic Wayfarer forum moderators will accept, before putting any suspicious players in probation. A ban would significantly make things right in the future.
For now what I see is, multiple players in group rather stay with emotional comments emphasizing the accusations, than go on the right track by collecting at least 1 photo as evidence to proceed.
Those are clubs they can sign up for as @Stealth991-PGO pointed out, not school registration.
The IGN in question isn't @djshari-ING Ingress IGN. @MissShariBelly-PGO is imitating her PoGo IGN, only difference is two letters.
You can actually see on these photos that the outline of the letters are visible to the **** eye. If you take a look at photoshopped picture they are completely missing.
👍️ Very persuasive
Current photos. No actual proof of a school has been shown because there is no school.
@NianticLC @NianticAaron @NianticAtlas
Here is a photo of one of the references to k-5th grade since you were unable to find any. Here is a photo from belly acres, its nestled between gilead and gilboa on w 34th st, hopefully this will help.
--obsolete comment--
I've wrote a detailed reply with screenshots from the photo editing detection tools I've used but despite my best effort (including links instead of photos) it still went to mod approval. In the meantime I invite you to check the original photos on ImageEdited (the most simplified tool) as well as the ELA values FotoForensics and Forensically (a bit more complicated to analyze, as I've explained in the comment that's pending approval, but look up FotoForensics' "Evaluating ELA" guide to understand that). All 3 of those are free online tools.
Honest question: do you truly believe someone would have the username "MissShariBelly" with absolutely no reference to the preexisting username "MissShariBerry"? Within the same geographic location too?
As for your request to upload evidence from photoshopping detection websites - completely fair. I'll try uploading links to screenshots to bypass forum moderating - let me know if the links don't work.
I haven't uploaded the result I got from imageedited.com because it just shows the "probably edited" result without pointing out to evidence on the photo itself (additionally, literally anyone can upload the photo to the website and see the result, it's completely free).
But I'll include results from other websites - this is the result from FotoForensics (the direct link should work, let me know if it doesn't) and similarly this is the result from Forensically.
In my original comment I've suggested that someone else with more knowledge about this stuff should comment about these ELA results because frankly it's a bit too technical for me. But, if I understand FotoForensics' guide correctly, then in a photo that was only saved/compressed once, ELA values become darker and more muted. Parts that were only saved once appear much brighter and with more contrast. My conclusion is that most of that photo was saved at least twice, and the text on the bottom half of the photo was only saved once (hence, edited in). That shows up in the ELA analysis result from both websites. But again, my understanding may be faulty, so I'll welcome comments from anyone with more experience than me.
You are continuing to spread misinformation. Since when are school hours 6:30p-8pm from September to April?
And that picture you posted is just a residential house.
The only thing I found nestled in the description you gave were residential homes on Google maps.
thank you for going out to take those photos. With your photo evidence you can see that the squares do show up at certain distance\angles/quality like in your first photo. The second photo I don’t see any squares do you? Even with different lettering with shows the issue unless you photoshoped your photo which I highly doubt. Thank you for the help clearing up these false photoshop claims. Hopefully now admins can see your post to help backup my removal request.