Ligitations / legal help

How can we get urgent help, since Typlo who is mentioned in the forum is not receiving PM's and MrMario is receiving but not respondiong to PM's?
Emails are received but not answered? The matter is too sensitive so we can't discuss the whole matter in the open.
Our forum needs very urgent help.
But how can we get this needed help?

Hi Flik,

Typlo is no longer a part of the company for like... a fiew monhts already, his account has not been active for a while and there is no point in trying to contact him. I'm presuming it's night at MrMario's place so you'll have to wait till evening(our) if you are waiting on a PM replay.

If you have a forum to litigate against you can use this https://help.forumotion.com/t12330-complaint-against-a-forum-how-to
That's basicly the only way to complain against a forum or If you have recieved a message from FM that your forum will be deleted I'm afraid no one can give you reasons for it.

Sorry Flick, this is all that I can do now with this amount of information.

Thanks Nera,
I'm new here so i didn't know about changes.
I sent MrMario the urgent PM two days ago and they are read but not replied.

Both cases are the matter.
So we probably will not get any help or information and the forum deleted while there is nothing wrong, just an angry banned spammer?
And the other abusive forum can continue?

The tool only gives option to complain against an abusive forum. But there is no way to get any information of help / support when you receive such a message yourself. No contacts possible.

Hi Flick,

1. IF YOU GOT BANNED (YOUR FORUM)
If you got banned (your forum) than MrMario can not help you and there is no reason to contact him. The banning (OnlineGuardian) is not conected to the support forum and it's staff/volonteres and none of us can give you the reason for it or help you to get your forum back. If you think that the banning did not have foundations than use the contest decision button and that will go to the official part of the company. Only that way your forum can be restored if they find your complaint to have foundations.

2. COMPLAINT AGAINST FORUM
As for the other forum, use the link I gave you in my first post. That's the only way to go. MrMario also does not handle those things, he is not an official, does not work for FM like none of us. If you use that link I gave you your complaint will go to the official part of the company, the people that deal with litigations.

3. MESSAGE FROM FM, COUNTING TEN DAYS UNTIL DELETATION
What kind of message you need support for? Did you get the ten days counter?
If you have recieved a message from FM to your panel saying your forum is in violation of TOS & counting ten days until deletation than it's true. You have to reread the TOS and inspect your forum and remove all that might violate it. When you remove all the message will still count until it hits zero and than FM's litigation staff will inspect your forum. If they see you have removed it the message will dissapeare and your forum will stay.

4. YOU GOT AN ABUSE
If you have recieved an abuse (That is found in Misc > Abuses) you can ignore it, move it to done and that's all. The abuse is sent to you through the report an abuse button that is found on the bottom of your forum/footer and only you get that message not Forumotion. And that is something you don't have to vorry about.

Hope I cleared things for you at least a bit

Hi Nera,
The whole matter is rather sensitive, so i can't explain it all in the open.
I'm not banned, i'm the webmaster myself. We banned a very abusive stalker / spammer.
Hence these problems with the ten days counter to our forum.
There should be any way to communicate with the company.
It's a pity MrMario didn't respond at all to my PM's, nor clearing that part and maybe giving instructions how to defend ourself or forwarding my message to the company like i kindly asked or give an email address we could use for contact.
English is not my forst language so i might express myself as fluent and kind as i like to be.
With these frustrations .....

than use the contest decision button and that will go to the official part of the company. Only that way your forum can be restored if they find your complaint to have foundations.

Sorry? I don't see such a button? Can you please tell me where do i find that?

Is there a message from Forumotion on the first page of the administration panel?

Only the ten day counter with only a link to terms of service, no other buttons or links.

The button will appeare after you get banned. I mean the Contest the decision button. Basiclly, FM doesn't give out warnings (ten days counters) without basics. They wont issue it only based on one complaint. If the spammer complained he had to provide screen shots of the abusment on your forum or there are questionable sections (warez, 18 etc.) on your forum. If something like that exists you can not only hide it you have to delete it cause FM will have acces to it. There is really nothing to vorry about if none of this is found on your forum:

• Violent or repulsive content
  
• Hateful or abusive content
  
• Defamatory content and / or affecting the integrity of a person
  
• Sexual and/or pornographic content
  
• Harmful and dangerous acts
  
• Copyright infringment
  
• Spam
  
• Phishing and/ or malware website
  
• Credit card fraud
  
• Hacking
  

Even if Mario did answer your PM he would not be able to tell you anything more than me. As I told you Flick, if you got the ten days counter it's more likely that there is a reason for it than the other way around. Check your forum for any of these things, if you don't have them, there is nothing to vorry about. But if you have them, you MUST delete it. Don't vorry about Englsh, mine is preety bad too

Well then more likely it has nothing to do with the member who was banned, but with your forum breaking the Terms of Service.

You will have to reread the Terms of Service and go through your whole forum.

We did read the TOS very fine. We allowed guests postings for a while. The banned member posted via proxies and own IP stuff we didn't want in the forum, created screenshots before we could delete stuff. Threats, full names, spam, harrassment, hunted for personal data about persons and their children, posted full data with ages and names and addresses etc. Mostly middle of the night. The stalker even placed links to their own personal data and the data itself. Which we al removed.
Most probably screenshots were taken as a proof to accuse us from wrongs. Which the spammer placed there, not us, and we have normal time to get rid of all that garbage.
So we closed the forum for guest postings and then started the legal complaints.
And agressive postings in their own slanderous forum. Which we reported of course.


If our forum gets banned / deleted after those ten days i dont think there will be any contest button, since the forum will be gone?

If you found that that was a problem and now you have closed your forum for guests and deleted all the things he has posted, when FM inspects in the tenth day and finds the posts to be removed (does not find them) your forum will stay. It's as simple as that. The forum will stay. That is 100% since I had a similar problem once

If something else was the problem and you did not remove it your forum will be banned and an online guardian page will appeare on it's place (when you click on your address the first things you see will be ad fly and than you press skip and see the page of OnlineGuardian) with the contest the decision button and in that I'm 100% sure.

Thanks for that.
It would save so much time for everybody if the reson or link was given and it could have been solved in a few button clicks. Now we searched even with a police officer the whole forum for possible wrongs.

I know it is a bit frustrating since I was in a similar situation too, but nothing can be done about it, it's the company's policy. I can understand both sides. Don't worry about it Flick. If you are certain that the problems were caused by the spammer and that it has been removed than you have nothing to vorry about. They wont look what was on the forum, they will look what is on the forum. If everything is cleaned form the things I stated up than all will be OK.

I'm sure you know for sure Nera, you're helping very fine. Thanks.
Wished i could send you some backgrounds explanation by PM. But it wouldn't help the case, but maybe give some idea what's really going on.

@slg i was not intentionally ignoring your posting. Nera was quicker!
We went through all other TOS and corrected whatever we found could be discutable. With the policeman with us.
We don't have hidden parts with forbidden stuff. Nor do we promote that in any way.
We do have however the option for some users to be added to a special users group to discuss their personal problems and place proof of that. And those discussions are in no way forbidden.
If the spammer / person who reported our forum would have sent screenshots from those areas, it would be proof of their own illegal getting into those restricted parts.
I'm not going to tell in the open which information and discussion is there in those areas.

I'm not going to tell in the open which information and discussion is there in those areas.

Just make sure that you don't discuss nothing from the list I posted up since FM has access to hidden areas.

Some victims of the spammer / stalkers are discussing the abuse, their experience, posting proof etc.
But this is in a protected area. Of course we are aware FM can look there, we have nothing against this. I hope they are aware it is a protected area where the victims get help. This proof can include some data but never full names nor addresses etc. If known nicks if necessary.
Not any other or illegal matters. No hatred or abusive content.

Also since this forum says you need to keep discutable postings for at least a year, i suppose we should keep them in the archives.

Flik you can keep in your archive anything that is according to Tos, that should not be a problem All you need to is remove the things that violate the TOS before the number hits zero no matter who wrote them. It's as simple as that. If those conversations don't include hateful or abusive content, violent or repulsive content and someones private data, +18 or warez you are fine. If that can be found there or in your archives, delete it, punto.

All you have to do is remove anything that is in violation,
If members are continuing to discuss things that may be breaking tos somehow, then tell them not to discuss it any longer.

The bottom line is that you are responsible for running your forum and following TOS, If you and your staff are maintaining and keeping up on the forum on a regular basis, along with removing and not allowing any violations to take place, then you have nothing to worry about.

Thanks, Nera and Kirk.
I think we did everything humanly possible. Copied discutable stuff the violating guests kept posting for proof.
To proof their intentional activities, we allowed guests postings again for a few days and immediately the offence started again by the same persons.
We banned them, sent complaints to their ISP, friendly emails to stay off, blocked their IP, they came back via proxies etc.
They just want to stay on our backs forever and making sure our forum gets closed. Klinging on us like .... violent .... can't say the word.
We keep removing the kind of postings. In fact every posting of those people is bad stuff, accusition, slander, threat, harrassment, impersonation, etc. Several people's forums became closed due to these same nasty users.
Really hope forumotion tells us which exact page / posting is wrong and we'll be glad to remove it without any hasitation. Continuing our own lives in peace.

I got your Pm

I have no idea what report/violation was reported on your forum.
Forumotion do not tell you what or where the violations are on your forum for two reasons.

The first reason.Litigation's simply do not have the time,(they have to many other reports to go on to and investigate),So they are not going to tell you or point out the threads on your forum that have been reported or are in violation, This is not their responsibility.

The second reason is, It's forums admins,founder and staff responsibility to run and maintain their forums., This means you have to check all post content as they are posted and remove anything that may be in violation as you go along. If you have staff and they are checking all post content as they are posted, then you should not have any violations remaining on the board. Of course you may not be able to get to every post at once,But thats why you should have all the moderators you think are necessary to better help keep the forum maintained and up to date.

Other then that, Since you have gotten a waring from litigation's in your admin panel, then forumotion feels whatever was reported they did not have to shut your forum down immediately and will give you time to remove any violations.

So all you can do is go through your post/threads and remove anything that would be a potential violation. Um??? You said something about some sort abuse taking place with children or something?

If there is some sort abuse going on that involves children or even bringing some sort of serious harm to an adult? Then i suggest you gather all information of the parties posting the content on your forum and report it to your local police along with your service provider,They will then tell you what other actions to take if any, they may do it their self's, it depends what the crime or abuses are? If there is another forumotion forum with such abuses taking place, then you send me the links and screen shots and i will send it off to a pro-admin my self to be shut down and or handed over to the appropriate authorities.

The reason i have replied here and not your PM is for others to see this as well.Staff here on forumotion Support are not in anyway affiliated or have anything to do with forumotion Litigation, With the acception of Thegodfather, All staff here are here for tech support and support related questions, However like i said above, If there is something happening on a forum that is presenting real danger or bring someone in to harms way, then and only then would we pass any reports on. Other then that all reports have to be reported to forumotion litigations, I mean we get people all the time telling us some sort of story of this and that , and that and this. It has to be reported to instigations.
Litigations are the only ones that can look into,investigate and take any necessary actions for what is reported

Thanks Kirk.
There is no violation and children abuse involved in our forum. The spammers tried to give this impression with placing childfren's names and ages and all data in our forum, which we removed immediately of course.


I think if the forum was reported for some pages or postings, those pages or links could be told us so we can correct the matter.
Of course we can remove the whole forum from public sight.
But in our opinion from the first start we removed everything and are in accordation to forumotion TOS. And still our forum was reported without telling us for which exact reason, so we are unable to correct what could be wrong.

From the PM you can understand why we are not able to tell everything in the open.
We sent Godfather emails time ago but no reaction.

Ok

Since the questions have been answered i will now mark and lock the thread.