Hi all,

hope this is the right place for this issue.

On monday a user I contacted (concerning the new license) via the OSM messaging system answered me via normal e-mail: When he wanted to accept the CTs, he got the following message (in German):

Benutzerkonto gesperrt Dein Benutzerkonto wurde aufgrund verdächtiger Aktivitäten automatisch gesperrt, um potentiellen Schaden von OpenStreetMap abzuwenden. Diese Entscheidung wird in Kürze von einem der Administratoren überprüft. Du kannst dich aber auch direkt an den Webmaster wenden, sofern du diese Angelegenheit klären möchtest.

Short translation: Your account has been suspended due to suspicious activity.

User link

It's just a guess: In the moment some users are very busy in "re-mapping" hugh areas. The edits of the user I contacted are already totally re-mapped. Perhaps there is an automatism like: If a specific quantity of a users edits are deleted -> he might be suspicious -> suspend his account, when he tries to accept the CTs. In this Wiki list you can find also a lot of "none existing" user, I don't think that they are all misspellings: Wiki Maybe some of them wanted to accept the CTs.

I experience another increasing phenomenon: user links in the OSM Inspector (license change view) are leading to none existing accounts. Since it's not easy to delete an account, I suppose that there might be an interaction between an automatism to protect the OSM database and the deletions of data due to re-mapping actions.

Two examples in the same area (OSM Inspector) example1 example2

If I am right OSM might loose a lot of valuable data. And last but not least, how can we help user "NaviComputer"?


asked 09 Feb '12, 21:04

meridianeum's gravatar image

accept rate: 0%

edited 09 Feb '12, 22:41

SomeoneElse's gravatar image

SomeoneElse ♦

My question about Navi-Computer is: How can somebody help him to get his account back. Because it is suspended since the moment he pushed the button to accept the CTs. In this minute he send me the message that his account is deleted, and he doesn't know why.


(09 Feb '12, 22:09) meridianeum

I notice that you've spelt "Navi-Computer" differently in two places in this question. Can you link to a node, way or relation that they've edited so that we can find out the correct spelling in the database (including any possible hidden characters)?

(09 Feb '12, 22:43) SomeoneElse ♦

Sorry, you're right the link was wrong - I forgot the hyphen -, but the result is the same: http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Navi-Computer

(09 Feb '12, 22:50) meridianeum

Can you link to a node, way or relation that they've edited?

(09 Feb '12, 23:23) SomeoneElse ♦

Sorry, nothing left. Everything is deleted by another user. I don't remember exactly the ways - but I will ask.

(10 Feb '12, 00:25) meridianeum

First of all: as it seems I made a great fuss about nothing and my postings were slightly confusing - maybe it was a bit late that day. (Ex)-user "NaviComputer" (this is the right spelling) told me, that he can't remember the streets he worked on. If it still matters: I am quite sure, that he mapped some residential streets in this area: http://osm.org/go/0Dkz8UWku- Thanks for your efforts!


(13 Feb '12, 23:17) meridianeum
showing 5 of 6 show 1 more comments

The "Aloisius78 " user actually has a space at the end of their user name. I found this out by looking at the raw XML of a way that they had modified, from one of your "osmi" links above.

You can look at their user page by using %20 instead of the trailing space, like this. That won't show the %20 as you hover over the link but the link will work - you can type it in manually of course.

permanent link

answered 09 Feb '12, 22:41

SomeoneElse's gravatar image

SomeoneElse ♦
accept rate: 15%

"user_34262" (who edited some data in your other wtfe link) I can't help with. "http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/28953287" is a way edited by them, but there's no user page.

(09 Feb '12, 22:58) SomeoneElse ♦

Thanks, that's interesting and helping. I knew that there are problems with special characters like ä, ö, ü etc.. I corrected them manually. But a missing space at the end is like a ghost. :-)

(09 Feb '12, 23:07) meridianeum

Looking at example one are you looking for this user? If so, there is a chance that they have renamed their account. The ID will remain the same, but the username will be different, and without any suitable data sources to say what ID links to what username, OMSI etc won't be able to link to the current username.

This might change when a new full history update is generated as I think that will show user id and current name; I think one is planned for next week. But at present, if they've renamed their account and haven't edited recently there is no easy way to link a user id to a username as far as I know. To be honest, if I didn't care about the licence but were annoyed about all the emails I was receiving about it the first step I'd take would be to rename my account to make myself harder to find (I'd then change my linked email address to one I don't check any more).

I can't comment on your guess, but hope the account can be unsuspended so they can accept.

And finally, I'm not sure what your question about NaviComputer means - they are one of those users whose user page says no user.

permanent link

answered 09 Feb '12, 21:39

EdLoach's gravatar image

EdLoach ♦
accept rate: 22%

Your answer
toggle preview

Follow this question

By Email:




Answers and Comments

Markdown Basics

  • *italic* or _italic_
  • **bold** or __bold__
  • numbered list: 1. Foo 2. Bar
  • basic HTML tags are also supported

Question tags:


question asked: 09 Feb '12, 21:04

question was seen: 4,880 times

last updated: 13 Feb '12, 23:17

powered by OSQA