A peek into Reddit's anti-spam internals Ʊ lyra's epic blog
A peek into Reddit's anti-spam internals
2026-06-27 ¦ reddit
\[](/abspin)--><br>[](/lyrahai)5 years ago, back when I still used Reddit, something unusual happened. My app of choice, Relay for reddit, was bombarding me with a bunch of weird notifications about removed spam.
Getting these notifications wasn’t unusual in and of itself - I was a moderator of a few fairly small subreddits that’d from time to time get posts automatically removed for spam. However, when I went to actually look at the removed spam, I saw something I was never meant to see.
I saw Reddit’s anti-spam internals.[](/txt! "also hi! yes, we have ponymotes ^^")
so that's about it.
Removed: spamurai (*Removing potential spam content from unproved user*:
comment `t1_pupp13` (0.7294469 perspective spam) by u/GoodBoyBacon (0.06 days old, spammy: 11, hosted: false, -1 karma, 4 reports, org: `ComcastCable`, email: gmail.com) in r/GoodBoysOnly (guest) posting nil from `oauth.reddit.com` via `nil` from UA: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/95.0.4638.54 Safari/537.36 Edg/95.0.1020.30, RHS: oc:ac:kT:lw:bV:aX:af:a6:l5:y3:aT:m9:pt:f3:hZ:az:aR:aQ, LANG: en-US,en,q=0.9, TLS: j7bXVc3l/qer8FRj2aEiqOrx1ro=DDZ0TViWlY5HYgOPw1SZqDxwiO8= - referrer: https://www.reddit.com/, thumbnail: `` -<br>BadGuy67? He's the same guy as https://www.reddit.com/r/ReallyBadGuys/comments/qw3rt1/if\_ur\_a\_bad\_guy\_post\_here\_please/```<br>https://www.reddit.com/r/GoodBoysOnly/comments/qw3141/if_you_see_an_account_called_badguy67_do_not/pupp13-->) • GoodBoyBacon • 1 points • 27 min<br>You see u/BadGuy67? He's the same guy as https://www.reddit.com/r/ReallyBadGuys/comments/qw3rt1/if_ur_a_bad_guy_post_here_please/
Removed: Reddit (shadowban applied on 10-27-2021) • GoodBoyBacon • 0 points • 1 hr<br>I'm not the same guy as that other guy please read my comment
How Reddit moderation works
So Reddit is a site comprising of smaller sub-communities, which are called subreddits. For example, /r/mylittlepony is a subreddit for fans of My Little Pony. These subreddits can be created by anyone, and they are moderated by a group of community moderators appointed by the creator of the subreddit.
If we go1 on /r/mylittlepony we can see the list of moderators on the sidebar: -->
MODERATORS
MESSAGE THE MODS
message sent.
Orschmann
optimistic_outcome
Chinch335
IllusionOf_Integrity
spokesthebrony
TheeLinker
Lankygit
Raging_Mouse
Searchbar_Trixie
gbeaudette
...and ...and
[](/hellohuman)These moderators can remove posts, ban users, manage modmail etc, but they are just normal Reddit users.
If you’re a moderator you can see who removed a post or comment:
Removed: rebane2001 • ExampleUser • 1 points • 1 hr<br>I'm breaking the rules 😈
This includes the automod - a rules-based moderation system:
Removed: AutoModerator • ExampleUser • 1 points • 1 hr<br>bad word
But then you’ll sometimes also see the mysterious “Auto”:
Removed: Auto • ExampleUser • 1 points • 1 hr<br>hi
This is what happens when something gets caught in Reddit’s mysterious spam filters, or when Reddit’s sitewide admins remove something manually.
In the moderator log, they’ll show up as “reddit” and “Anti-Evil Operations”:
filter by action: all<br>accept moderator invite<br>add community topics<br>add contributor<br>add moderator<br>add note<br>add removal reason<br>adjust post crowd control level<br>approve award<br>approve comment<br>approve post<br>ban user<br>chat approve message<br>chat ban user<br>chat invite host<br>chat remove host<br>chat remove message<br>chat unban user<br>collections<br>community status<br>style community<br>community welcome_page<br>widgets<br>create award<br>create scheduled post<br>create removal reason<br>create rule<br>delete award<br>delete scheduled post<br>delete note<br>delete overridden subreddit classification<br>delete removal reason<br>delete rule<br>app changed<br>app disabled<br>app enabled<br>app installed<br>app uninstalled<br>disable award<br>disable post crowd control filtering<br>distinguish<br>edit comment requirements<br>edit post requirements<br>edit saved response<br>edit scheduled post<br>edit flair<br>edit rule<br>edit settings<br>enable award<br>enable post crowd control filtering<br>events<br>award hidden<br>ignore reports<br>invite moderator<br>invite subscriber<br>lock post<br>mark nsfw<br>mark as original content<br>mod award given<br>enroll in new modmail<br>mute user<br>override subreddit classification<br>remove community topics<br>remove comment<br>remove contributor<br>remove post<br>remove moderator<br>remove wiki contributor<br>reorder moderators<br>reorder removal reason<br>reorder rules<br>request assistance<br>set contest mode<br>permissions<br>set suggested sort<br>show comment<br>snooze reports<br>spam comment<br>spam post<br>mark spoiler<br>sticky post<br>submit content rating survey<br>submit scheduled post<br>secret easter egg --><br>unban user<br>unignore reports<br>uninvite moderator<br>unlock post<br>unmute user<br>unset contest mode<br>unsnooze reports<br>unmark spoiler<br>unsticky post<br>update removal reason<br>ban from...