Recent forum spam

[MadGypsy]

Surely something better than relying on an admin to do "morning checks" and deletions needs to be done. We have a number of talented programmers here. Some of us even already program in the languages necessary to combat this nonsense. Surely, we can create a solid solution to this problem.

I am dead serious when I say I offer my time, skills and knowledge to solving this for good. I cannot simply provide a solution. This will require teamwork from the top and some trust that no matter what people think of MadGypsy it is not in my heart or desires to do anything nefarious to this site.... quite the contrary.

In other words, I can't just blindly invent a solution and I also can't do it alone.

[Rampage]

It took me 2 seconds to delete it, I've banned the user. It happened 3 times in the past two months, but since the last attack, it hasn't happened in a few weeks; that's because Solecord turned on the anti-spam tool.

There's 3 of us here who have been cleaning and banning.

If the problem persists I think we can certainly explore what else can be done.

[Adam]

Is it humans distributing the spam, I mean, is it ever humans or is it always automated?

If it is always bots, then wouldn't something similar to the captcha system work?

A basic maths question or similar.

Then once you have been a member for a month it switches off, or not, I wouldn't really mind if it stayed as long as it doesn't involve too much hoop jumping.

Or you could employ a heavier handed gatekeeper system, whereas all posts and threads have to be moderated first within the initial 24hrs that an account is created.

Unfortunately I have never been able to get my head around programming. I wish I could. So unless you need help with a batch file, I'm no use.

Edit : Rampage beat me to post, how does the anti-spam tool work?

[Rampage]

Is it humans distributing the spam, I mean, is it ever humans or is it always automated?

If it is always bots, then wouldn't something similar to the captcha system work?

A basic maths question or similar.

Then once you have been a member for a month it switches off, or not, I wouldn't really mind if it stayed as long as it doesn't involve too much hoop jumping.

Or you could employ a heavier handed gatekeeper system, whereas all posts and threads have to be moderated first within the initial 24hrs that an account is created.

Unfortunately I have never been able to get my head around programming. I wish I could. So unless you need help with a batch file, I'm no use.

Edit : Rampage beat me to post, how does the anti-spam tool work?

It blocks certain accounts from registering altogether.. I guess based on IP or country, not sure, whatever the parameters Solecord set it to.

[Solecord]

The current tool I have installed uses a central repository of saved data and compares user ip, username, and email address to prevent sign ups.

[Focalor]

Yeah, Captcha will prevent 99.9% of spam bots from being able to register, but it won't stop the rarer human spammers from registering and posting junk links everywhere. You can set up posting restrictions that require a moderator or admin to manually okay every post by a new member up until a certain number of posts or days (a vetting period of sorts), but that will be extra annoying work for admins/moderators, and will also possibly be so annoying to new members that it discourages them from continuing to hang around. Honestly, the best way to handle it is to use a spambot registration prevention like Captcha and then manually ban the occasional humans spammers that weasel in.

Also might be worth mentioning that these forums should consider seeking SSL certs soon. You can pay for it, but I think there might be one or two places that do it free. All the browsers now are starting to add warnings to pages where logins aren't secure with SSL.

[MadGypsy]

Another option is to force sign-in with Google or Facebook. Google is the weak link because you can get as many accounts as you want but, it's more complicated to have numerous Facebook accounts and it takes a lot of steps to make one.

However, with both it may be possible to contact either complaining that you are getting numerous spam posts from their members..... ?

[vegetous]

Another option is to force sign-in with Google or Facebook. Google is the weak link because you can get as many accounts as you want but, it's more complicated to have numerous Facebook accounts and it takes a lot of steps to make one.

However, with both it may be possible to contact either complaining that you are getting numerous spam posts from their members..... ?

I'm not trying to be more tracked by google or facebook! That's the reason I never log with facebook or google accounts to other services than their own, so definelly don't try to force me to do this, or the forum will lose another user.

[MadGypsy]

That would be a shame. Conversely, if we lost a couple/few members due to making this place nicer for those that come here it would be an acceptable loss.

Maybe, way more people feel like they will stop coming here if the spam continues/worsens. It's rarely possible to please everyone.

I mean this in reply to your statement, not as a direct message to you, Vegetous. However, I doubt you need worry about a Google or Facebook login appearing here... probably ever.

[MadGypsy]

Really, to get rid of our current spammer is very simple...

Any post containing foreign characters is immediately kicked. It is SUPER rare that someone posts in something other than the English alphabet here and even then it's always small talk between two people that happen to speak a Slavic language.

[Solecord]

I can assure you we won't require anyone to use a Google or Facebook login.

[Rampage]

That would be a shame. Conversely, if we lost a couple/few members due to making this place nicer for those that come here it would be an acceptable loss.

Maybe, way more people feel like they will stop coming here if the spam continues/worsens. It's rarely possible to please everyone.

I mean this in reply to your statement, not as a direct message to you, Vegetous. However, I doubt you need worry about a Google or Facebook login appearing here... probably ever.

I disagree, many valued members here don't use Facebook and we don't want to alienate those people.

[Mr.Burns]

(Monty nervously puts down his popcorn, rises from his chair straightening his tie, gingerly raises his hand and after clearing his throat says... ) I don't and probably never will use social media. There, I have finally purged the demon. Yes by all means use whatever method you have to to make this place better for the community as a whole. If I had to be one of those casualties MG referred to then I would be willing to "take one for the (Quake) team".

Kind regards

Mr B

[talisa]

I disagree, many valued members here don't use Facebook and we don't want to alienate those people.

exactly.... i dont have facebook myelf as i dont see the appeal of those so-called 'social media' websites...
i dont get the appeal of posting your personal life and info online for every creep on the internet to see and read

[MadGypsy]

I don't use social media either but, I have a Gmail account, which is all you would need to do what I proposed. However, it doesn't matter cause like I already knew and some admins already said, that solution would never happen anyway.

The purpose of my solution isn't to alienate anyone. It was a possible IDEA where spammers are forced to log in with something that isn't so anonymous. I'm not even sure that my idea was solid because, I don't know if contacting Google with "[email protected] is spamming my forum and I need to put an end to it...." would result in anything at all.