Goodreads Authors/Readers discussion

Kind moderators I am being harassed by various profiles with comments on my author profile, in my opinion they are spam and malicious, can you please intervene?

This is the second message that has appeared on my page for several days:

https://www.goodreads.com/author_blog...

I am seeking newly published indie book authors to interview. If you are interested, please email me to be considered for a featured author interview this month plus promotion on the website and social channels. I can be contacted at lots.ofbooksemail3456@gmail.com. I am not very active on this site. For quickest response, please email me.


https://www.goodreads.com/questions/2...
John Moore Are you still offering review copies? My email is b.ooks35sensesa@gmail.com. I can read pdf and epub. I cannot download from Kindle or booksprout.

I've been getting these too, only started today

Paul wrote: "I've been getting these too, only started today"

I am not left in peace for 3 days; I delete their messages, and they continue. :(((

Same.

Yep same here. I have been having this issue for about a week now.

Since no one is responding, I found a temporary solution. I deleted the messages from those individuals, and then I went to my author page, author/dashboard, and from the settings.

Question Digest Emails OFF
Question Digest Emails None

But I don't think I solved much. :(

Georgiana wrote: "Since no one is responding, I found a temporary solution. I deleted the messages from those individuals, and then I went to my author page, author/dashboard, and from the settings.

Thanks for this suggestion I am tried it, but we will see what happens.

Let's hope the situation changes

I also had this. Also got the same messages on my personal email. I blocked the addresses in the email service and turned off the Ask the Author feature here. And reported it.

Eileen wrote: "I also had this. Also got the same messages on my personal email. I blocked the addresses in the email service and turned off the Ask the Author feature here. And reported it."

I did Georgiana's suggestion and for now it has worked, but I still have the issue that through the group discussions there will be a rash of comments from fake accounts hounding for review copies on Sprout, and giving one of two email addresses.

All you can with the group discussion comments (in addition to reporting them frequently) is ignore them or drop the group.

Since I made this post, they started harassing me in Italian and didn’t stop there, they started defaming me on more than 5 fake accounts saying they read my book and found it trash when in reality I know that no one has read it and no one has bought it the English version, Star among the stars. How can they talk about my book?
They are making an abuse of negative reviews right now, they give one star with 7 fake accounts in 5 minutes

And they also wrote this, all of which is obviously not true.
"This author is crazy. He takes time to write to local newspapers about the punishment of gay activists and this book is horrible. If anything, the author should be punished for writing this nonsense… "

Wanda Vega, Austin Reid, Meredith Rodgers, Marylou Landry, Wayne Watkins, Kristine Mann, Ada Ivera, Mary Ramsey fake accounts

Getting reviewed bombed by fake accounts that dropped my rating, after reporting the harassing spam of demands to review books. I reported this to Goodreads, but I think their workers are so overwhelmed at this point, but they are doing their best to fix this problem. Since it seems to be site wide.

I'm shocked by the situation, with me they raised the level of threats and defamation.

Georgiana wrote: "I'm shocked by the situation, with me they raised the level of threats and defamation."

It is getting utter ridiculous at this point. I am guessing the aim of the bots that are probably making the accounts is to drive authors off the site. I hope this gets addressed by Goodreads soon.

Raven wrote: "Georgiana wrote: "I'm shocked by the situation, with me they raised the level of threats and defamation."

It is getting utter ridiculous at this point. I am guessing the aim of the bots that are p..."
Yes, they even say that's their goal. Do not engage with them.

Avoid this account which is fake, it was among my friends, he contacted me via message, I naively replied to the message saying that I am an Italian author since then the insults and defamation have been written in Italian on my author profile, before it was called Cris.
https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/1...

Eileen wrote: "Raven wrote: "Georgiana wrote: "I'm shocked by the situation, with me they raised the level of threats and defamation."

It is getting utter ridiculous at this point. I am guessing the aim of the b..."

I am not going to engage them. I am just going to report them.

Yes, I blocked them and also reported them, but no action has been taken in their confrontation, I see that their profiles are online.
And the 8 profiles that have a star to my book are more or less the same ones that gave a star to your books too.
Honestly, as authors we should be more protected and should not allow these subjects to try to destroy our work.

Thank you very much kind moderators for your precious help, you are wonderful people ❤ ❤ ❤
Friends if you have had similar problems to mine, write to Goodreads Support, they will help you, they are wonderful people.❤ ❤ ❤

Thank you moderators for fixing my reviews and dealing with the fake accounts!

If you publish a list of their names, we can all block them,

Gail wrote: "If you publish a list of their names, we can all block them,"

Georgiana already did in this thread.

Eileen thank you for your support :)

Gail Hi :) These individuals, through a program, continuously create various profiles with different names to cause disruption and destroy our work. Therefore, we must be very vigilant because even if they are blocked, they endlessly create these fake profiles.

They started again with death threats towards me and my family, and very heavy insults.

Death threats against me and my family, who send my data to criminals who will cut me to pieces, and they send my pieces to my family.
They said they will take my book and publish it under their name.

Monsters!

I too. Deleted them, but very disgusting.
There were five short paragraphs on my blog comments.

Crazy.

Sounds pretty extreme! Was recently review loved myself and am still a bit staggered I haven’t gotten any real response outside of a pat on the head by the site staff.

Hi, Guys, just a heads up re: these useless pieces of human excrement. All your posts are not unusual for them. They've been a plague on this site for at least 3 years. That's how long I've been dealing with them! Their attempts at harassment started with the 1-Star ratings on my 3 books, then escalated to saying my dad was an A-hole and my mum a Bi**h and that I wasn't fit for living. They added that they wished my whole family would die horrible deaths and die of cancer! Lately, they bother me on my 3 email accounts threatening to publish one of my books with AI in their names and they're going to send all the local thugs and serial rapists my info.

One way to spot them is the rubbish about them not being on this site very often and they can't download from Kindle so just to email them at some bogus Gmail account. Another way is their accounts are always set to private and they have no friends or posts and no profile picture! As soon as I spot them, I report them to Goodreads, which gets them kicked off. Sadly, they open new fake accounts and bother more new authors. They try to extort money from people to stop scamming them. That's illegal. These are Nigerian scammers and always claim they're not from our country and our laws don't affect them. Well, the fact is, the FBI has been making a lot of arrests in Nigeria for many such scams. They aren't immune so hopefully this nonsense will stop someday soon. When you get one of these comments or emails, click the Flag button (only on the computer site, it's not on the app) and it will take you to a form to report them. I have also turned off the Ask the Author section of my profile. As for the emails, I have blocked them on all my accounts. They always use that Anonymous site to send them so they can't be traced. This is all really tiring and I will be glad when it stops for good.

I'm another writer that has received vile emails from 'Anonymous'. They said all my books had been sent to pirate sites, to leave Goodreads and all social media or else. Don't submit to these bullies, that's all they are.