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From the guidance on spam and offensive flags:

Additionally, any answer that accumulates enough offensive or spam flags will be automatically deleted.

What if a bunch of lunatics simply cast offensive flags for fun and random posts get automatically deleted? Does SE have some mechanism to prevent this situation?

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  • 6
    It'd need to be multiple people conspiring to flag the same post; it requires multiple flags for automatic action to be taken and you can't flag it multiple times.
    – icktoofay
    Feb 27, 2014 at 3:15
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    Since six red flags are needed to delete, you'd need five friends to nuke stuff like this. Or five sockpuppets with 15 rep. (Which sounds scarily not-hard.)
    – michaelb958--GoFundMonica
    Feb 27, 2014 at 3:16
  • possible duplicate of How does deleting work? What can cause a post to be deleted, and what does that actually mean? What are the criteria for deletion?
    – jmac
    Feb 27, 2014 at 5:00
  • 1
    Re the close votes: I think the possibility of this happening is something worth keeping open and addressing. Is there a way to deal with it? Could it be happening, and is something in place to handle that eventuality? Is it just the assumption that whoever it is will notice their reputation drop and contact a moderator?
    – doppelgreener
    Feb 27, 2014 at 5:43
  • 6
    The amount of hypothetical situations involving six lunatics is endless, why'd you choose something as exciting as flagging posts?
    – Wold
    Feb 27, 2014 at 5:52
  • 2
    Or one lunatic with six socks...
    – Paul Bellora
    Feb 27, 2014 at 6:05

1 Answer 1

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Well, it takes six spam flags for that to happen. So unless you encounter six lunatics that happen across the same post and flag it, you don't need to worry about it.

If you did find yourself in a situation where a post was inappropriately deleted as spam or offensive, you can flag the post and use a custom flag to explain the situation. A moderator can clear all spam/offensive flags, automatically unlocking and undeleting the post, as well as clearing any penalties from the deletion.

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  • 8
    Does the system lists out posts deleted by 6 spam flags in the tool for diamond mod?
    – nhahtdh
    Feb 27, 2014 at 5:44
  • 1
    @nhahtdh No, someone would have to tell us if this particular abuse occurs.
    – Bill the Lizard
    Feb 27, 2014 at 13:15

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