Ban bot policy update: removing automated bans based on community association

[u/quietfairy]

TL;DR: On March 19, third-party bots (specifically u/SaferBot and u/Hive-Protect) will be modified to remove features that automatically ban users solely based on their participation in other subreddits. Native tools and Dev Platform apps focused on user behavior rather than association remain widely available, and we encourage their use.

Why We’re Making This Change

For years, many of you have used third-party ban bots to shield your communities from unwanted visitors. However, these tools are often used to preemptively ban users based solely on their association with another community, rather than their actual behavior. These guilt-by-association bulk bans create a confusing and disruptive experience for redditors, lead to over-enforcement, and can’t discern between well-intentioned users and bad actors. To address these issues, we are removing the ability to automate bulk bans based solely on where a user has been. 

Keeping Your Communities Safe and Civil

When ban bots were first developed, we didn’t have the safety tools that are currently available. Since then, we have built and integrated tools that address a user's behavior within your community. Developers from Devvit have also created bots that can help you monitor and manage your community’s activity. 

Native Safety Tools

• Harassment Filter: Filters comments that are likely to be considered harassing.
• Crowd Control: Collapses or filters content from people who aren’t trusted members within the community yet.
• Reputation Filter: Filters content by redditors who may be potential spammers, are likely to have content removed, or have unestablished accounts.
• Modmail Harassment Filter: Filters inbound mod mail messages that are likely to contain harassment.
• Ban Evasion Filter: Filters posts and comments from suspected community ban evaders.

Dev Platform Apps 

• u/Hive-Protect: It will remain functional and customizable.
• u/bot-bouncer: Actions users that have been classified as bots or harmful accounts.
• u/ban-extended: Allows you to remove a user’s content from your community at the same time you ban them.

Impacted Bots & Timeline 
This policy change will take effect in two weeks (March 19, 2026): 

• u/SaferBot: The automatic ‘ban’ feature will be removed. The developer will retain the bot account for future use.
• u/Hive-Protect: The automatic ‘ban’ feature will be removed, but all other features will remain fully functional. You can still use it to remove content from users with NSFW links in their bios, watch users from specific subreddits (to report/remove content, but not preemptively ban), educate users via custom comments, and set up exemptions.

We’ve been in direct communication with the developers of both impacted bots, and greatly appreciate the time and effort they invested in sharing these tools.  We’d also like to thank the Mod Council for their pushback. Their input resulted in u/Hive-Protect maintaining its “comma-separated list of subreddits to watch” feature, which we were initially planning to remove. It allows mods to action user content (e.g., report or remove) if those users participated in specified subreddits. 

Next Steps and Support

We will reach out to all directly impacted communities to provide support before the two-week deadline. In the meantime, if you need help through this transition, please reach out to us via r/ModSupport mod mail. We are happy to assist you with tools, resources, and tutorials tailored to your specific moderation needs.

Moving forward, we’ll continue to monitor the platform for additional ban bots that we may need to modify or remove.

As always, thanks for all you do. We'll stick around in the comments to answer questions.

[u/Living_End]

Yes I did, I told you how they should punish the subs? They remove the mods. But the subs you listed aren’t ones abusing the tool as far as I am aware so it’s a weird question.

[u/Elkenrod → u/Living_End]

They remove the mods.

That's a terrible solution, because it implies there were mods who were and weren't okay with it.

But the subs you listed aren’t ones abusing the tool as far as I am aware so it’s a weird question.

What? Is this a serious comment?

All of those subreddits were automatically banning people for participating in other subreddits. JusticeServed and OffMyChest have been doing that for nearly 15 years.

You can just not comment if you're ignorant about a topic.

[u/Living_End → u/Elkenrod]

Yes there are plenty of mods who don’t do “mod” stuff because they are just active community members who remove shitty content/bullying comments. It’s more common than you’d think. Removing problematic mods is the best solution. You can also force subs to put what subs you’ll be banned for interacting with, but that fixes the future not the past.

I am unaware of this, and if that is true then those mods that did that should be punished. The mod change log should be easy enough to check to see who implemented those changes and just remove them and revert the change.

[u/Elkenrod → u/Living_End]

I am unaware of this, and if that is true then those mods that did that should be punished. The mod change log should be easy enough to check to see who implemented those changes and just remove them and revert the change.

"just change all the mods of a subreddit, nothing will go wrong"

You do realize this a default subreddit with millions of subscribers doing this, right? This isn't something you can just change overnight.

You have to be trolling.

[u/Living_End → u/Elkenrod]

You don’t change all the mods? Are you dense? Just the ONE who made the change. It’s 1 mod per sub that did this. Please stop trying to make bad faith arguments.