Fake Nomination Hub
Hi folks,
I have been detecting some suspicious activity around a place named Mogra, Amodghata, West Bengal since last few months. This place is being filled with fake nominations at its peak. I have proper proof to what I am going to elaborate here. The wayfinders in the locality are foul playing with the complete wayfarer system. They are stealing the images from other location and submitting in there. I have seen this area being reported once already in 2020 for such things and Niantic mods taken necessary serious actions against them. I have tried to report through forms but among the 200ish portal around the region almost 100 are fake or stolen from other areas. It's impossible to report them one by one individually. I would urge Niantic to completely look this area down and to do the same this time around as well along with flagging the wayfinders spamming 5* on each of them. One of them had openly accepted in this forum that he has 10+ eligible ingress/ Pokémon GO account which indeed is a violation of ToS. I would now highlight some points as my proof.
1. Portals being added in a straight line which totally makes sense for foul playing
2. Fake Google Map markers added to different places to make reviewers from other region believe the place is present. (Eg. Temple tag on barren ground with satellite showing nothing but open fields)
3. Multiple Wayspots Accepted inside primary school (K-12) premises.
4. Wayspots with different language getting Accepted. People of West Bengal speak Bengali and there's not a single legit Wall Painting in Hindi language anywhere, but this region has many of them.
5. Multiple Wayspots accepted with Watermarked image.
6. Now coming to the current nomination I have found on review.
This is being definitely stolen from a nomination from Gorakhpur, UP. If you combine the main & supporting image the school name is almost clear to be "Modern Heritage Academy". Upon searching on Google map I found the school here, https://maps.app.goo.gl/1DKgvFu1e2GcUsxWA
and one of the picture from outside the is this one
The exact same writing "Vidya Dadati ..." ("Vinayam" isn't visible) is the exact same one on supporting image of the one in review screen. This is blatant example of Wayfarer abuse.
Please take immediate action against all the PoIs accepted in this region and the people who has submitted and spammed 5* on each of them.
Thanks & Regards,
Mysticjit
Comments
@NianticAaron @NianticCasey-ING @NianticGiffard @NianticKN-ING For your reference the Geo coordinates of the location is 22.985559,88.380749. Please take immediate action after verifying all of them. Thanks in advance.
Not only Mogra, many other places also have this type of wayfarer abusing systemic portal submission.
I definitely agree with this, I have seen many duplicated nominations from this particular place and they are totally misusing the wayfarer for foul gameplay, stolen photographs, wrong location. This needs to be stopped.
This place needs to be sanitized , Certain players/agents need to lose wayfarer access
The link you shared is my report of another area. Please correct it buddy!
I am really sorry @Mysticjit-ING, its my fault that i added your report link instead of mine. This time i add the link which i am reported two weeks ago. I apologise for my fault to you and team niantic.
Thanks for flagging, @Mysticjit-ING! I'll share your report with our team and will follow up with information.
Today I found another suspicious sub from mogra, kuntighat. It seems everything is ok but if we look carefully we can see that all the shops and place names are written in Hindi, it seems impossible, because in West Bengal it should have been written in Bengali. Judging by other reviewer's experience I think this is a fake sub, so please kindly look into this matter. @NianticGiffard
Hi @NianticGiffard Today I also found one fake nomination from the same location Mogra.
The plaque on the statue shown in the image is clearly written on a different language than Bengali (seems Odiya to me). The language spoken in the region is Bengali and a plaque can't be having some other language from a different state altogether. Please do some action against these thieves as soon as possible. They are defaming the wayfarer system by such fake nominations.
Another day, another fake nomination I am getting in Review from the same location Mogra Amodghata.
Review Screenshot:
This one is stolen from Behala, Kolkata, West Bengal. Even in the supporting image the club name is clearly written as: "Banamali Naskar Netaji ..." (Google map link: Banamali Naskar Netaji Sporting Club
https://maps.app.goo.gl/NrcxuuMUv5v11Hit5)
Original Portal link:
Please flag this region. Too much of abuse this is happening for that particular area.
Seems like is the same person who submitted them judging by the same supporting info
"This is easily accessible and a very good wayspot. This is beside the main road. This has also a great cultural significance."
(at least the Ambedkar statue and the ghost)
And also the school wall art which is there in the main post. They have a group of trainers/ agents who do these things in-line.
Hi @NianticGiffard I have found another fake wayspot live from this location.
Real location portal link:
Fake location:
Please take serious necessary actions against all the people doing this kind of stuff and please clean the whole area. This is getting too much.
@NianticGiffard @NianticCasey-ING Any update on this report? It's already been 3 weeks since I have reported and the area is getting more fakes each day. Please do something soon.
Hi @Mysticjit-ING! Your report is currently in the queue for review however I have followed up with our team to prioritize yours. You'll get to hear from us soon.
Hello @Mysticjit-ING! We have reviewed the report and have taken action on the 86 Wayspots and the 11 Wayfinders in accordance with our policies. While we are unable to discuss our actions in detail to protect the submitter’s privacy, they may include, but are not limited to, sending a warning message, placing restrictions on their Wayfarer, Pokémon GO or Ingress account, putting their account on probation, or placing a temporary or permanent suspension on their Wayfarer, Pokémon GO or Ingress account.
Thanks for helping us maintain the quality of the Wayspots.
Thanks @NianticGiffard for taking action against those! But I can still see many fakes in here even after this cleaning. Please take another look at those and take serious action against them too. For example I can provide some which are definitely fake:
1. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.987568,88.376817&z=17&pll=22.987568,88.376817
2. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.98941,88.376639&z=17&pll=22.98941,88.376639
3. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.990705,88.375517&z=17&pll=22.990705,88.375517
4. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.986791,88.36943&z=18&pll=22.986791,88.36943
5. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.983534,88.370373&z=18&pll=22.983534,88.370373
6. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.989736,88.375971&z=16&pll=22.989736,88.375971
Thanks for the follow-up! We have taken action against these Wayspots as well.
Hi @NianticGiffard I was checking in intel map but I can still see all of them alive. Can you please consider to recheck once. Thanks :)
@Mysticjit-ING @NianticGiffard
I guess that there is still a portal in the intel map is due to the backend. Here is similar reports.
Also, regarding the Korean abuse, these portals are still remained.
https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=36.370254,127.343772&z=18&pll=36.370629,127.343913
Thanks for the follow-up, @Mysticjit-ING, and @AgentMAenlight-ING! We have given it a second look and can confirm we have removed the Wayspots. The problem you're experiencing could be due to a delay in the synchronization.
Hi @NianticGiffard I am again getting the same fakes in review those are been reported in this thread. The people around Amodghata, Mogra, West Bengal are constantly making more and more fakes daily. Please do take some strict actions against them. Please flag this area from getting new PoIs approved. I have some more links of fake and stolen nominations. Please consider taking another look in the area.
1. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.980765,88.380784&z=15&pll=22.980765,88.380784
2. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.982844,88.381154&z=15&pll=22.982844,88.381154
3. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.988134,88.379716&z=15&pll=22.988134,88.379716
4. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.983521,88.373401&z=15&pll=22.983521,88.373401
5. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.988952,88.374004&z=15&pll=22.988952,88.374004
6. https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.987349,88.377713&z=19&pll=22.987349,88.377713
Ineligible Things live:
1. Swimming Pool: https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.992875,88.386435&z=17&pll=22.992875,88.386435
2. Portals inside (K-12) school ground, for example : https://intel.ingress.com/?ll=22.976097,88.38473&z=18&pll=22.976097,88.38473
Yet another fake in voting from the exact same area:
The main image clearly reads the exact address and location of the object and this nomination is stolen from the following portal located in Howrah:
@NianticGiffard @NianticCasey-ING please take actions against these submitters. They don't deserve to be in the wayfarer system
Hi @NianticGiffard @NianticCasey-ING today also I got yet another Fake nomination from the same location. This was earlier reported by one of my fellow Wayfinder in the same thread. Please do something about this area.
We have reviewed the report and have taken action on the 6 Wayspots and the Wayfinder in accordance with our policies.
Thanks @NianticGiffard for update on those. But what could be done on the ones which are still in voting and we are getting to review. Is there any way to flag the whole area as it is now quite certain that they don't nominate anything that is legit? It is getting us very upset to see our nominations being stolen and submitted by some thieves.