To tackle trolls and bots abuse while you have an open mechanic like a Poll, Scoring, Votes, or Story, Flowics has 2 mechanisms to prevent these deceptive practices.
1. Web Local Storage
As votes in mechanics are anonymous, the registration of votes is at the browser session-level through the web local storage (a mechanism similar to cookies). If the Mechanic is configured for voting Only once or Once a day, users won't be able to vote multiple times unless they delete their web local storage.
Be Aware!
When reviewing the metrics and seeing the unique users count, be aware that these values are actually referring to unique browser sessions.
What happens if a user uses incognito mode?
Since the local storage/cookies are automatically deleted every time an incognito tab is opened (Safari) or a new incognito window is opened (Chrome), this generates a new browser session allowing the user to vote again.
2. IP Blocking
In addition to local storage restrictions, Flowics has another mechanism to prevent abuse. If a user submits more than 30 requests in a 10-minute time window, the IP will be restricted for 1 hour. The end-user will be able to continue voting, but they will not realize that their IP has been blocked and that their votes will not be counted by the system.
Keep in mind that we tweak our Abuse detection tools frequently, so these numbers might change.