'The problem is one of balancing hypergrowth with harassment. The changes are likely to alleviate the problems in the short term, but not everyone is convinced that addressing the harassment issue will be as easy as adding a handful of screening options.Īs Stewart notes, Keybase is not unique in its struggles to connect people freely and easily while also protecting them from bad actors. 'It won't be necessary for most people – especially after the blocking features launch – but it will 100 per cent shut down all unwanted contact.' 'These options will create a custom walled-garden experience,' Keybase said. What's more, Keybase says in the coming weeks it will allow users to specify that they can only be contacted by users with whom they are directly connected, something the site calls 'the nuclear option'. Keybase, for its part, says it is working on a new interface with more controls for users, including the ability to block and report users directly to an administrator with two clicks. It has been increasing in seriousness and intensity for several months 'It has been increasing in seriousness and intensity, though, for several months, and a really notable uptick in the last month.' 'The harassment has been off and on forever, any messaging platform that lets one be visibly a woman and allows unsolicited messages will get some,' Stewart said. Aria Stewart, a Keybase user since 2014, quit the service over the relentless, prolonged harassment including numerous sexual propositions. Some have even snubbed the platform entirely. And, what's worse, thanks to Keybase's policies, they have no way to block the initial messages. Netizens report that, in some cases, they are inundated with sexually explicit advertisements, are propositioned for sex, or are otherwise harassed. While many of those messages were of the annoying, shady business offer or coin scam variety, others were more personal and more disturbing. 'Unfortunately there are no good settings on Keybase to help reduce this noise there's no setting that forces people to go through a friending process no way to filter all messages from people I don't follow into a 'message requests' bucket like Twitter. Users cannot opt out of receiving a message from a follower or being added to a conversation.

Making matters even worse was a policy in Keybase that, depending on your viewpoint, was either a handy feature or a glaring shortcoming. right after the last round of Stellar coins being seeded out to those who are in the program.' 'There was a huge uptick in spam, unsolicited messages, etc. They're not much different than the multi-level-marketing people of the 'real' world,' explains Noid, a hacker and Keybase user who has extensively chronicled the issue and its underlying causes. 'Cryptocurrency people tend to be just really scammy 'get rich quick' types. This, veteran users say, attracted a new type of crowd solely interested in cashing in on the currency. The cryptographic-centric Keybase threw its lot in with the other 'crypto', teaming up with cryptocurrency Stellar to begin a series of free 'drops' where the coins were distributed into users' wallets.

Keybase file sharing