Editing Soot (section)

==== Possible M&A by KolymaNET ====

{{CIAContentWarning}}
===== Background =====

On July 3, a thread was created in /b/, by a schizo who <s>forgot to take his meds</s> started dropping redpills about the state of Soyjak.party.<ref>{{CitePost|board=b|no=16294|caption=Kolyma, a so-called network from Russia that buys imageboards (soyjak.party/suggest//res/5328.html is an example) and provides free hosting and technical support (pic1)|date=July 3, 2021|url=https://archive.today/1hw1L}}</ref><ref>Alternative archive: https://archive.is/hySa8</ref>

[[File:Kolyma conspiracy theory - Kolyma Twitter.png|thumb|We may be under new management!]]

OP summarized his case as such:

<blockquote>Let's sum it up. Kolyma-network is a datamining project, not shy to overtake chans and blatantly force admins to sell their projects. Free hosting and technical support is a lure to gather under their control as many chans as possible. For what purpose? At the very least to gather information, the rest is food for thought. These people don't hesitate to lie about their "years" of age by creating pages about themselves on the wiki. Their lies have been proven above and preserved in webarchive, and their sites are nothing more than a cover that they change almost every week. Anon, spread the word, don't let some dataminers from Russia take over your favorite chans!<ref>https://archive.today/1hw1L#16296</ref></blockquote>

Some users pointed out that the captcha<ref>
https://archive.today/1hw1L#q16306: ''Soot was so inactive the last week and now all this with the captcha...''
</ref>
and CP spam<ref>
https://archive.today/1hw1L#q16308: ''Could kuz be the same tranime spammer who later spammed CP on soyjak.party?''
</ref>
may have the new owner's doing, and that datamining and spamming illegal material to force admins to surrender their chans wasn't outside of his wheelhouse.<ref>
https://archive.today/1hw1L#q16309: ''After that, Maki had to delete his chan because, according to him, Kuz threatened him with ddos, spam, and abuse reports.''</ref>

Soot replied, with the kindness and manners befitting an admin:

<blockquote>I never even got a fucking offer, fuck off with your garbage fake schizo spam<ref>https://archive.today/1hw1L#q16329</ref></blockquote>

===== The IP change =====

The schizo went on to point out a suspicious coincidence: the IP address that the soyjak.party domain points to changed on the same day that post was made.

<gallery mode="packed">
File:Kolyma conspiracy theory - Initial offer.png|This post was created on June 22.<ref>{{CitePost | board = suggest | no = 5328 | date = June 22, 2021 | caption = Hey guys, kuz here, world-famous imageboard buyer. I bought alot of imageboards | url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210704212455/https://soyjak.party/suggest//res/5328.html}}</ref><ref>Alternative archive: https://archive.is/PgVkz</ref>
File:Kolyma conspiracy theory - IP address change.png|The IP address that soyjak.party points to also changed on the same day.<ref>If you want to check for yourself, you need to be logged in. You can get a SecurityTrails.com login from BugMeNot: http://bugmenot.com/view/securitytrails.com</ref>
</gallery>

This could mean that either the Party was moved to a new server managed by Kolyma, and that thread was just misdirection,<ref>/b/16294, reply no. 16357: ''Looks like your admin already managed to sell his site, and the thread (''https://archive.today/PgVkz'') was a cover for people to keep posting so they could collect your data.''</ref> or that Soot was just messing around. The second explanation is slightly more likely. Looking at the IP address history:

* Soot has used Cloudflare before, to mitigate the load on the server.
* GigeNET also offers DDoS protection.<ref>Although at a steep price: ''Add any server for $125'', https://www.gigenet.com/ddos-attack/</ref>
* HostSlim BV is a Dutch hosting company.<ref>https://bgpview.io/asn/207083</ref>
* DataIdeas LLC is a hosting company located in Texas.<ref>https://bgpview.io/asn/398355</ref>
* All of ColoCrossing datacenters are in the US.<ref>https://www.colocrossing.com/company/</ref>

===== A fake Soot? =====

[[File:Kolyma conspiracy theory - Schizo connections.png|thumb|A summary of this conspiracy theory.]]

<s>If the website had really been sold to the Russians, you wouldn't expect to see European and American companies, would you?</s>

<s>On the other hand, that's ''exactly'' what one would do, to lure users into a false sense of security...</s>

According to the schizo infographic, the admin of KolymaNET lives in the USA, because he's wanted in Russia for tax evasion.

Soot himself testified that he changed servers to try and improve the performance of the site:

<blockquote>
Really? Are you fucking serious? Yeah, me changing hosts to try and improve the performance of the website is apparently me selling it.<br/>
The fact you think this site is worth any sum of money is the funniest part about this post, really. I honestly wish someone would give me a few grand, but unfortunately I make zero dollars monthly from this website, and I doubt it's worth any amount of money.<ref>{{CitePost|board=soy|no=128642|caption=Really?|date=July 5, 2021|url=https://archive.today/9SgFA}}</ref>
</blockquote>

Several chuds doubted that this was actually Soot. The overtly angry tone may either be a cheap imitation of Soot's seething rants, or the new admin seething, because he got exposed:

<blockquote>
you're trying too hard to imitate soot's butthurt tone<br/>
i know a falseflagger when i see one<ref>https://archive.today/9SgFA#q128827</ref>
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
soot, no need to get aggressive<br/>
otherwise schizos would think you are kuz<ref>https://archive.today/1hw1L#q16330</ref>
</blockquote>

<blockquote>Sounding a bit defensive there, traitor.<ref>https://archive.today/1hw1L#q16332</ref></blockquote>

<blockquote>yep he got called out and now hes quivering in fear, you can hear his voice shaking through the soot microphone we installed some time ago"<ref>https://archive.today/1hw1L#q16333. Nice [[GET|trips]]!</ref></blockquote>

===== Other suspicious clues =====

[[File:Kolyma conspiracy theory - Kolyma spam services.png|thumbnail|Uh-oh, soybros...<ref>{{CitePost|board=soy|no=129168|date=July 5, 2021|url=https://archive.today/9SgFA}}</ref>]]

The KolymaNET Anti-Spam Database is used to <s>maintain a list of enemies of the State</s><ref>Entry #166 is labelled with ''enemy of the network''.</ref> gather information about abusive users on imageboards.

There is one entry in their database, labelled "soyjack.party" (sic).<ref>See entry #192. https://web.archive.org/web/20210705191316/https://spam.kolyma.org/spam.php</ref> According to the page (emphasis added):

<blockquote>To submit an IP adress to the database, please use the form below, select the category the IP belongs to, and then submit. '''The submission will have to be verified by an agent of the Kolyma Network''', and once they are verified they are cemented into the database.</blockquote>

The fact that a ''random IP address'' was verified can mean one of two things:

* The 'Party is already under Kolyma's control, and they can the IPs for each post.
* This is just a psy-op/troll submission by Kuz.

[[File:Kolyma conspiracy theory - Kuz posts on soyjak.party.png|thumb|Kuz renews his offer.<ref>{{CitePost|board=soy|no=129200|date=July 5, 2021|url=https://archive.today/9SgFA}}</ref>]]

[[File:Kolyma conspiracy theory - Kuz's tripcode.png|thumb|Kuz's tripcode, as seen on his website.<ref>https://archive.is/eNwrh</ref>]]

The second possibility is more credible, because a few posts later in the thread, Kuz used his tripcode to prove his identity, and stated that he's serious about buying Soyjak.party.

{{Quote|>B-but that doesn't look like a secure tripcode, and besides, doesn't each imageboard have its own secret, so that the same password on two different boards will generate two different tripcodes?}}

Being in denial has never helped anyone. Take your meds and face the truth.

'''Kuz's tripcode was leaked on July 9, 2021. It's #kuz4'''<ref>{{CitePost
|board=soy
|no=131813
|caption=btw kuz's tripcode is kuz#kuz4
|date=July 9, 2021
|url=http://web.archive.org/web/20210709210427/https://soyjak.party/soy//res/131813.html}}</ref>

Another suspicious clue is how the e-mail service for <code>admin@Soyjak.party</code> is Yandex Mail,<ref>{{CitePost|board=soy|no=129170|caption=>yandex / U-um bros......|date=July 5, 2021|url=https://archive.today/9SgFA}}</ref> a Russian company known to collaborate with the Russian government.<ref>{{CitePost|board=soy|no=129172|caption=Ummm SOOOOOOOOOOOT why would a non-Russian deal with a Russian corporation that sends data to the KGB????????|date=July 5, 2021|url=https://archive.today/9SgFA}}</ref>

Soot addressed that accusation as such:

<blockquote>
I've used it pretty much since the start of this site? I don't think email as a whole is secure at all, so I don't really care about using Yandex. I just use it since it's free. If you wanna give me 5 bucks for a year I'll host it elsewhere, but otherwise Yandex is free and good enough considering I don't use the email for anything very important like sensitive info.<ref>{{CitePost|board=soy|no=129238|caption=I've used it pretty much since the start of this site?|date=July 5, 2021|url=https://archive.today/9SgFA}}</ref>
</blockquote>