stopping the spammers

[Tannin]

Doug, you probably know about this already, but just in case .... On one of the wikis I run, spam was a problem until I installed recaptcha - http://recaptcha.net/ - whick killed it stone dead. Free, good cause, very easy to use, recomended. If you want something to lock the bots out, this has worked for me. It even has a ready-made plug-in for Mediawiki, so I imagine getting it to work with vBulletin would be falling of a log easy.

 

[Handruin]

Thanks Tony. I was looking at the vbulletin website and I believe the latest version now includes the actual reCaptcha code that you mentioned. I'll look into getting this installed soon. I don't know where this most recent flood of spammers is coming from. We had been fine for a while until the past couple days.

 

[Tannin]

Yeah, we seem to get waves of spam, followed by periods of quiet that last quite a while. I get the same on the sites I run. It's just whenever someone happens to write and distribute a new batch of bots, I guess.

 

[ddrueding]

Aren't there settings to prevent a users first post from including links or images? I think that would fix a big chunk of it.

 

[Handruin]

I'll have to check, but I don't think the permissions are that granular. Just keep reporting them like you have been, it's been helping, so I thank you much.

 

[udaman]

I'll have to check, but I don't think the permissions are that granular. Just keep reporting them like you have been, it's been helping, so I thank you much.

Suggest you check with vB forums. I have seen another site @3.6.6? that probably is using another hack, after you reg, the 1st post most be approved by Admn, before it appears in a thread, you get an pop-up message that your post has been submitted for review by Admn.

Or you can use the one here, though the hacks seem to be buggy (didn't read all 15 pages):

Forbid Users from Posting Links or Images if They Have Fewer than 15 Posts
http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=96018


which I got to from here:
Restriction on newbie URL posting

http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=101346



Probably could PM the mod who posted the link and ask for any others known?

 

[[Edit]]

Patricia
Join Date: Feb 2008
Posts: 0

Re: Edit

---------------

Hi,
I'm new here, how's it going?

"Buddhism has the characteristics of what would be expected in a cosmic religion for the future: it transcends a personal God, avoids dogmas and theology; it covers both the natural & spiritual, and it is based on a religious sense aspiring from the experience of all things as a meaningful unity" - Albert Einstein

---
Patricia

Mmmmmmmmmmm! SPAM!!! I love the smell of SPAM in the morning. Well, not as much as the smell of napalm in the morning. But, otherwise, thanks for the free SPAM, Patricia!

 

[DrunkenBastard]

We got a significant surge of "Russian Spam" in the last couple of days. Produced quite a burden on our anti-spam services/servers.

 

[LunarMist]

Perhaps I'm being paranoid, but lately there are many new members with suspicious names.

 

[Handruin]

Yes, and I go through them every few days to delete. None of them can post until I validate them, and none of them have contacted me to ask for permissions, so I'm not worried about it.

 

[LunarMist]

The names are sillier yet. The kids have nothing else to do?

 

[udaman]

The names are sillier yet. The kids have nothing else to do?

Otay!

U mean the spam bots... like.... "Edit", "Splash" "wavemaker" "discfarm"...etc, there was a rash of postings in rapid succession by those recently

 

[Handruin]

They don't seem to give up.

 

[LunarMist]

There is a new member added seemingly every time I log it in.

 

[Handruin]

They don't give up at all. I have all new registration moderated. I should just disable new registration.

 

[ddrueding]

They don't give up at all. I have all new registration moderated. I should just disable new registration.

Not entirely sure about that. Although it seems likely that we will get new members, or that those members will be a good match to our interactions, we could at least hold out some hope...

 

[LunarMist]

We'll become extinct like Shakers eventually.

 

[LunarMist]

168 guests are online.

 

[udaman]

168 guests are online.

Webcrawlers/spiders mostly I would guess. Still, up to 226 members recently, the spammers are relentless .

Google’s CAPTCHA busted in recent spammer tactics

 

[ddrueding]

The spammers are relentless, but considering they can no longer post, we are safe from the storm. Imagine if every new user just make one post per forum...ick.

 

[LunarMist]

Have any legitimate prospective members been found recently or are they automatically rejected?

 

[ddrueding]

Have any legitimate prospective members been found recently or are they automatically rejected?

I got a PM from someone looking to be activated a little bit ago. I passed it onto Handruin for approval.

 

[Handruin]

I give them a while (several weeks) before deleting them. There are a few like the one mentioned above that I do active when the PM me.

 

[LunarMist]

Hey, why do they continue? Now some ED treatment scammers... )

 

[Handruin]

I purged that one. vbulletin 3.7 is now out with more spam-related functionality like reCAPTCHA. I'll upgrade and hopefully it'll reduce the number of spam accounts we get.

 

[hacksaw]

Hey, I'm real, and I'm not a spammer!

I'm getting flooded with spammy email lately though. It's gone through the roof in the past couple of days.

 

[ddrueding]

All my SPAM filters are staying at ~95% SPAM.

And hacksaw,

Welcome to StorageForum!

 

[LunarMist]

What spam filters?

 

[ddrueding]

I use NoSpamToday with all my clients that require an exchange server. I set up pretty strict rules, and they mark ~95% of the mail coming into any given domain as SPAM.

 

[LunarMist]

Oh, I thought it was your personals.

 

[ddrueding]

I use Google to host the mail for my domain, so I have no idea how much SPAM comes in. I actually get about one a month, Google's SPAM filter is the best in the world IMHO.

 

[timwhit]

I would agree with that.

 

[LunarMist]

It appears that the spammers have returned to SF. Are they are creating accounts manually or is there a bot exploit?

 

[Handruin]

Could be automated now. Most were manual because of the way the signup process makes you answer simple random questions. Perhaps they've figured out the questions and answers now, so I'll just change the questions.

 

[Bozo]

On some sites, you must copy some letters and/or numbers into a box. These letters/numbers are hard to read and change with each register.
Would that help here?

 

[Handruin]

On some sites, you must copy some letters and/or numbers into a box. These letters/numbers are hard to read and change with each register.
Would that help here?

It used to help (CAPCHA) and we used to use it, but was easily broke a while ago. I stopped using it and have tried other things to stop automated systems from getting through so easily.

 

[Handruin]

I've been using this stop forum spam website to reference the e-mail addresses that have been coming in. It's a handy tool and they offer an API with it. I'd like to integrate it with the forum to check the registering e-mail address before allowing them an account.

 

[Handruin]

The spam has been immense lately for some unknown reason. I've deleted at least 75 new registrations and a multitude of spam posts that many of you have reported to me.

I've disabled new registration for the time being until I can figure out a better solution.

 

[jtr1962]

This might be of help. Spamming was a problem on CPF until the new policy was put into effect. Specifically, here's what was done:

In an effort to reduce spam in the forums by new members who only register in order to post spam, restrictions have been imposed on all new registrations.

1) The first 2 (two) posts that a new member makes (regardless of registration date) are put into a moderation queue before being posted in the open forums. A CPF moderator or administrator then reviews the post and the user account for validity and suitability. If the post is nothing but spam, the account is immediately banned and the post never sees the light of day in the forums. If the post is not spam, it is approved and shows up where it was intended to be posted. After 2 posts have been approved by a member of the CPF staff, the 3rd post will not need moderation and the user account is "promoted" to full posting privileges.

2) Until a new user account has been approved and vetted in the above manner, the account has NO private message privileges. Again, this is due to new users registering for spamming purposes only. They use the PM system without ever making a post in the forums. As with above, once the new member has posted 2 posts and the account has been approved and vetted, full board privileges are instated.

 

[Handruin]

That is a possibility, but we lack the high volume readership that they have in order to manage the moderation. Have they mentioned any specific modifications to vbulletin for spam management? I didn't see any specifics in the post you linked to, but if you could find out, I could try implementing them here.