Hmm, idk, I had two accounts in the past and I wasn’t even using them for anything nefarious, but I got a reply from dang asking me to not use multiple accounts, so I went back to using just one account.
Seems from my experience that at least to some degree dang is on top of making sure each person has only one account.
But again, the situation may be different when people intentionally try to do sketchy things. If someone uses separate browser sessions and separate VPN connections then there would not be much HN could do to discover that multiple accounts belong to the same person, except if the person with the accounts made the mistake of displaying voting ring behaviour, i.e. a number of accounts upvoting each other, and that sort of thing
Then again, the most obvious way to combat this problem is to require a bunch of verifications, like providing your phone number and a scan of your passport/drivers license and a selfie and so on.
And I am happy and thankful that HN does not require all ‘at.
HN's best defense against that is probably that it doesn't take many flags from older accounts to kill a comment from a new account.
Whether these accounts were one person with an axe to grind, trolling by someone who doesn't really believe the arguments they were making, or coordinated activity by an organization, none of the comments stayed up longer than 15 minutes.
Seems from my experience that at least to some degree dang is on top of making sure each person has only one account.
But again, the situation may be different when people intentionally try to do sketchy things. If someone uses separate browser sessions and separate VPN connections then there would not be much HN could do to discover that multiple accounts belong to the same person, except if the person with the accounts made the mistake of displaying voting ring behaviour, i.e. a number of accounts upvoting each other, and that sort of thing