Charming Procrastinator

Let’s play the biggest game of kick the can on the internet.

Date posted: November 12, 2025

AO3 has recently seen a rise in guest spambot comments making false accusations about work creators or other users. For example, they may claim that a particular user is discriminating against minorities, trying to hide the fact that they use AI, or are at risk of having their works stolen or deleted.

These comments often copy existing AO3 usernames in order to make their accusations seem more legitimate. They may also try to lure people onto other platforms (similar to the art commission scam), or use fake links that actually lead to pornographic images.

As always, we recommend that you do not click on any suspicious links or give your contact information to scammers. Instead, simply mark the comments as spam or report them so that the Policy & Abuse committee can remove comments left by these spambots.

Learn how to recognize them and what to do below the cut!

threatening to report you/your fic to the authorities or your employers

alleging security concerns like your email being compromised or spyware on your computer

claiming that they know your address and are going to visit you at your house

saying that you will die alone and unemployed over the holidays

What these bots claim is not true. These accusations do not mean your work will be deleted or that your accounts are insecure. We recommend that you mark these comments as spam following the instructions in our previous post.

These examples also do not represent the full range of harassment comments that you may receive. We will continue to try and keep you updated about trends; however, please note that the exact wording the bots use will continue to evolve.

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I hate to think that ao3 had such vile people (sure there are some rude or entitled comments) but NOT this

WHAT THEY ARE AND HOW TO SPOT THEM

okay, I thought I should make this post since there has been an influx of scammers plaguing AO3 comments section and people are falling victims to them. so here it is;

WHAT THEY ARE

so far, there are three main types of these scam bots

bots that tell you AO3 is deleting works, and that you should delete the works yourself because your entire account will be affected if your works get deleted by AO3

bots that tell you your works are terrible

bots that tell you they want to draw comic panels from your works

ALL OF THESE ARE SCAM WITH MALICE INTENTIONS

bots that tell you AO3 is deleting works, and that you should delete the works yourself because your entire account will be affected if your works get deleted by AO3 are just trying to get you to delete your works, most certainly because they want to steal and/or use your works to train their AI and, once you delete your works, it becomes extremely difficult, almost impossible for you to claim ownership of your works when the original works have been deleted. AO3 IS NOT DELETING ANY WORKS.

bots that tell you your works are terrible are also just trying to get you to delete your works, most certainly because they want to steal and/or use your works to train their AI and, once you delete your works, it becomes extremely difficult, almost impossible for you to claim ownership of your works when the original works have been deleted.

bots that tell you they want to draw comic panels from your works are trying to hack your password, personal data and credit card information (they will say they see potentials in your work and are interested in drawing comic panels from it, and then they will ask you to discuss this with them on discord where you will have to pay/commission them for the “comics” you will never get, but you will get your password hacked, personal data and credit card information breached and stolen instead, do not fall for them).

HOW TO SPOT THEM

what all these 3 types of bots have in common is that;

most of them (keyword, most, not all) are guest users or empty accounts that have just been recently created.

their comments are all the same copied and pasted scripts that they mass leave on lots of authors’ works at random.

their comments are all vague, in the sense that there will be no mention of any specific characters’ names, no mention of any specific scenes or events from your works (granted, they need to be vague because they are bots, they never actually read your works, and they have to be able to use the same comments on other writers’ works too).

EDIT: I’ve been told they got “smarter” and are now mentioning characters by names and also specific scenes from the story. Most definitely because they ran your fic through AI and let AI write comments for them. So basically, if a comment, from someone you don’t know, ends in something along the lines of “I’d like to draw a comic panel about this”, “can we chat on discord (or anywhere outside of ao3)” or anything that’d require your email or other personal information, always assume that it’s 90% a scam.

report them for spam then delete their comments when/if you get them.

please spread this if you can. us writers gotta look out for each other. stay safe, everybody ♡

EDIT (Dec 10, 2025): NEW TYPE OF BOTS WHO THREATEN PEOPLE WITH LEGAL ACTIONS

AI industry groups are urging an appeals court to block what they say is the largest copyright class action ever certified. They’ve warned that a single lawsuit raised by three authors over Anthropic’s AI training now threatens to “financially ruin” the entire AI industry if up to 7 million claimants end up joining the litigation and forcing a settlement.

Anyway, the next night we watched a thing about some pig man who is supposed to live in Vermont. People said it had claws and a pig nose but walked upright like a man. Now, I happen to know that sideshows used to shave bears and present them as pig men. So every piece of evidence they gave of this monster sounds to me like a bear with mange.

So now the running joke in our house is that everything is bears. Aliens? Bears. Loch Ness monster? Bear. Every cryptozoological mystery is just a very crafty bear.

This must be Jon – Sansa has heard enough about him in the six years Robb has been at that school. She has never met him, though she knows Robb has gone over to Ireland to visit him the past few summers.

Robb is silent for a few moments as she waits expectantly for the proper introduction to his friend. Finally it comes, a hesitant, “Jon, this is my sister, Sansa.”

She watches Jon's brow furrow, his mouth turns down, his eyes go from Robb, to Arya, to Bran, before he says, “I didn't know you had another sister.”

Climate disasters will not affect us all equally. Climate change will hurt the global poor first and worst. While floods and droughts and heat waves and ice storms will ravage the world, the richest and most powerful will still be able to hop on a plane to whatever corner of the planet is still habitable, or go off in their space arc, or hide away on their Mars colony run by Indentured servants.