New Years Resolution -- More Spam?

[Curt]

What's going on? Did the spammers get together and decide their New Years resolution would be to inundate this forum in spam? It seems like there's a new one popping up every few minutes.

Anoree, laranger, and WhyYou: Thanks for your efforts to beat these guys back!

[mart]

I see no spam Curt!, guess it must be because of admins zero tolerance to it on this forum. The only spam i see is in my fridge!.

[WhyYou]

We work all night long while you guys are sleeping.

BTW...there have been over 56 spammers banned since the first of the year.

[mart]

Originally Posted by WhyYou

We work all night long while you guys are sleeping.

BTW...there have been over 56 spammers banned since the first of the year.

I knew we had great admin on this forum.

Spammers! go home!, your wasting your time spamming this forum!.

[Curt]

Plus the hundreds of "new members," many of them having advertising in their signatures or as their home page.

[WhyYou]

Originally Posted by Curt

Plus the hundreds of "new members," many of them having advertising in their signatures or as their home page.

We delete signatures and home pages that have advertising in them and ban any members who repeat the offense.

[Curt]

Originally Posted by WhyYou

We delete signatures and home pages that have advertising in them and ban any members who repeat the offense.

Understood, but in reality that's spam too, it takes your time to clean up, and many here may not realize it's happening.

[Enigma]

Originally Posted by WhyYou

We work all night long while you guys are sleeping.

BTW...there have been over 56 spammers banned since the first of the year.

so in 8 days, this forum has seen 56 spammers, I would love to know what the total is for the rest of this year, I think you all do a brill job at removing spam, you may not be online sometimes, but we all know how to let you know.

I may make a thread on how to report spam, and have links to admins PM, then people can report it, there is a report button, but not knowing if the admins are able to see this in the ModCP/AdminCP, this may be a way to go about it for new members

[WhyYou]

Update on bans since the first of the year -- 121

[Enigma]

Originally Posted by WhyYou

Update on bans since the first of the year -- 121

it's been 9 days, and theres 121, when will it end.

I did a little calc, and 121 over 9 days, so rounded up to 10 days will give you 4416.5 be the end of the year, if it carrys on like this.

[365 / 10 = 36.5] [121 x 36.5 = 4416.5]

[WhyYou]

Latest update of bans -- 155

[Anoree]

Originally Posted by WhyYou

Latest update of bans -- 155

99 spammers in just 39 hours - 2.5 per hour. It felt that way. And they come in phases.

I hope our measures come into effect fairly soon.

[mart]

Originally Posted by Anoree

99 spammers in just 39 hours - 2.5 per hour. It felt that way. And they come in phases.

I hope our measures come into effect fairly soon.

Now you'd think the spammers would get the message, even with a thread that says their just not welcome here and will be banned immediately.
Maybe it's me, but if i was a spammer and saw this thread, i wouldn't bother with this forum.

[Curt]

Originally Posted by mart

Now you'd think the spammers would get the message, even with a thread that says their just not welcome here and will be banned immediately.
Maybe it's me, but if i was a spammer and saw this thread, i wouldn't bother with this forum.

I doubt that the spammers read this thread or care what's written here. Most of them, at least on initial creation of their account, never leave the control panel. The ones that post a message appear to just look for the most recently updated forum or thread to post their garbage in.

[Anoree]

I doubt that most of the spammers are even humans. I suspect that they're just little programs in BotNetworks, where a group of captured computers are controlled from elsewhere and do tasks like mailing spam, attack internet servers - or infiltrate forums to post spam - all automatically.
The owners of the computers used might only experience some loss of computing or surfing speed, if even that.

I've seen a kind of evolution in some of the spam posts: Early ones were just nonsense, some random words grouped together as "sentences." Then there were posts that apparently were copied posts from other forums. Now I see posts that include references to our forum - a new quality.

[mart]

Yes i guess your right Curt, didn't know spammers can be automated Anoree. Just a shame you have to waste so much time in removing this junk, i'm sure it's appreciared by all the members here.

[Natal]

Maybe require people to be signed up for a month before posts are allowed would help. Or something like that.

[Anoree]

Originally Posted by Natal

Maybe require people to be signed up for a month before posts are allowed would help. Or something like that.

I think that would only delay the spam posts. We see some banned users continuously trying to post to the forum for months now.

We're working on a solution to keep them out of the forum. I don't want to get into details of that openly, though.

[Enigma]

Originally Posted by Anoree

I think that would only delay the spam posts. We see some banned users continuously trying to post to the forum for months now.

We're working on a solution to keep them out of the forum. I don't want to get into details of that openly, though.

trust me, there are a lot of things that can be done on this forum to help stop the spam, and none of it is being done.

and every thing you can think of there is a way to get round it, so talking about it on the forum wont really stop them.

1. To post on this site you have to register.
2. Activated email verification
3. Activate Image Verification
4. Banned 'free' email domains many spammers use
5. To post they have to type in the image verification image.

And there are mant more things that canbe done , as this forum is very easy to spam, this forum will be on a list of easy forums, the spammers will first come to the place that they can spam the fastest, this makes sence as they get paied per click, the mre time it takes them to spam, the less they will want to come here and do it.

Then there are the spam bots, that no matter what you do they will still spam,

The idea is not to stop them all as this will never happen, but the idea is to slow them down, make it as hard for them to spam as possible, while still being user friendly.

This can be done by adding extra security to the forum, and the harder you make it, you'll then come of the "List" as an easy spam target, thus getting less spam coming in.

[Dan4life]

So will we as members will be offered special member promotions. What are our ensentives or bentfits as members for the new year in 2011. What kind of new changes will be expected this year.

[Anoree]

Originally Posted by enigma2

1. To post on this site you have to register.
2. Activated email verification
3. Activate Image Verification
4. Banned 'free' email domains many spammers use
5. To post they have to type in the image verification image.

1. As long as I'm here that always was the case.
2. That's now active.
3. This is also active.
4. That's something that would affect real users that we want to be here, too, so that's not an option.
5. This one would make posting more difficult for everybody, so that's not a real option either.

As you said, we never can stop all the spammers, the key is to make it as difficult for the spammers as possible while still having the forum user friendly.

We'll probably have a lot spammer accounts waiting to be activated to spam, but new ones should be mostly stopped. The amount of spams here should considerably go down now, even if it takes some time.

[Curt]

Originally Posted by Dan4life

So will we as members will be offered special member promotions. What are our ensentives or bentfits as members for the new year in 2011. What kind of new changes will be expected this year.

Hi Dan4life,

You may have better luck getting an answer to your questions if you post them in the forum for the site you're interested in. This thread is a discussion of the increase in spam since the beginning of the year.

[Enigma]

Originally Posted by Anoree

1. As long as I'm here that always was the case.
2. That's now active.
3. This is also active.
4. That's something that would affect real users that we want to be here, too, so that's not an option.
5. This one would make posting more difficult for everybody, so that's not a real option either.

As you said, we never can stop all the spammers, the key is to make it as difficult for the spammers as possible while still having the forum user friendly.

We'll probably have a lot spammer accounts waiting to be activated to spam, but new ones should be mostly stopped. The amount of spams here should considerably go down now, even if it takes some time.

I can't remember the sign up for the site, it's been a long time from when i first signed up, and you are right the last 2 points I made would not make the board user friendly.

I post count limit on new members may be an idea, lets say 10 posts before you can post a link on the board.

But if you do that then there is the chance they will make 10 posts saying somthing silly like "interesting" in every posts, thus adding to the spam.

Or you could mod every post from new member lets say 5 post, this means that every new member that signs up and makes a post to the forum, they have to have it checked out by the mods and admins on the site.

if you use the Mod the first 5 posts, and also restrict the PM so that a user has to make 10 posts, this will slow the spam down a lot.

Not only will they have there first 5 posts checked before there got on the forum, they will then have to make 5 more posts before they can send a PM, this means that they can't send PMs if they can't post to the forum.

you can find a lot of Mods to help with spam on this site:
http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=198

So have a look and see wat you can come up with

[Geezer]

Lots of posts on spam but I'm wondering about viruses, malware, and the many more nefarious things sites pick up and toss at us. Has anyone gotten a virus or anything similar from this forum, FTV, or Danielle's pay site?

[WhyYou]

Originally Posted by enigma2

I can't remember the sign up for the site, it's been a long time from when i first signed up, and you are right the last 2 points I made would not make the board user friendly.

I post count limit on new members may be an idea, lets say 10 posts before you can post a link on the board.

But if you do that then there is the chance they will make 10 posts saying somthing silly like "interesting" in every posts, thus adding to the spam.

Or you could mod every post from new member lets say 5 post, this means that every new member that signs up and makes a post to the forum, they have to have it checked out by the mods and admins on the site.

if you use the Mod the first 5 posts, and also restrict the PM so that a user has to make 10 posts, this will slow the spam down a lot.

Not only will they have there first 5 posts checked before there got on the forum, they will then have to make 5 more posts before they can send a PM, this means that they can't send PMs if they can't post to the forum.

you can find a lot of Mods to help with spam on this site:
http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=198

So have a look and see wat you can come up with

I have asked and post moderation is not going to be activated on this message board. It is too restricting for the good people and makes them feel that we Moderators are "better" than them.

I do go through the vBulletin Options periodically and when I find something that looks like it would be good for us I ask for permission to activate it. Some things get approved and some things don't. But we will continue the spam war and we will always win.

[Max]

I think everyone here has noticed that the spam has gotten out of control here. Are there any further steps we can take? There is probably only one person doing this because the number of spammers is much lower than you might think, but I am just wondering if there is a way to stop this, because it has happened before.

[Geezer]

Originally Posted by Max

I think everyone here has noticed that the spam has gotten out of control here. Are there any further steps we can take? There is probably only one person doing this because the number of spammers is much lower than you might think, but I am just wondering if there is a way to stop this, because it has happened before.

I have never seen so much spam on this forum. It is like someone opened the flood gates a couple of months ago. OR, they were being removed so quickly by the moderators that we never saw them.

[CK1]

I am really noticing a heigher rate of spam. i don't know if particular spammer have discovered the board or have developed an application to auto post on all these types of message boards.

[Max]

Originally Posted by CK1

I am really noticing a heigher rate of spam. i don't know if particular spammer have discovered the board or have developed an application to auto post on all these types of message boards.

A lot of times it is just 1 person. There aren't that many spammers out there, they just have certain algorithms in place to automatically send these messages to people/post them. I'm sure everyone here would be civilized enough to allow us to flag these posts for spam. I have always had the feeling that this forum generally advocates free speech, and nobody will abuse the system.

[WhyYou]

Every member of this message board has the ability to flag any post that they think is spam by reporting that post. There is a report icon on the lower left under the nickname of the poster.

There are 3 Moderators here and we have been doing the best we can to keep ahead of the spammers. However, since the first of this year the number of bans went from a little over 400 to over 2500 in one month. During this time we have had some controls activated. But any control can be worked through by a determined spammer. We have learned a trick or two to help us identify some spammers before they post their spam. But arbitrarily banning people because they look like spammers is not a good idea.

Recently, the amount of spam has diminished for the most part. There are still times when there will be peaks. Just remember that we Moderators must sleep sometimes.

[Max]

Here's a minor problem with the flagging system, and a solution:

Problem: You can only flag 1 spam every 60 seconds and the spammers send 2 messages at a time.

Solution: Allow 2 reports every 60 seconds.

[Max]

something else I noticed was those foreign characters in half of their messages. If you block those, you will block half of the incoming spam at the moment.

[Anoree]

When we get on here to delete a reported spam post we'll take care of any other spam we find along with that. There's not really a need to report all spam posts.
Should we miss a spam post (like an older post re-edited) we'd be thankful for that post to be reported.

[ugo]

ITS BOOMMM HERE

[Anoree]

Welcome back, Ugo!

Yes, it's a boom here. We've banned about 2.500 spammers or spammer clones this year already. (The spammer clones may not have gotten around to post spam.)

It's a pest right now, but we do our best to keep the forum spam free. We'll get them all eventually.

[ugo]

Hi Anoree

Its been did good works from moderators here.

[Max]

Originally Posted by Anoree

Welcome back, Ugo!

Yes, it's a boom here. We've banned about 2.500 spammers or spammer clones this year already. (The spammer clones may not have gotten around to post spam.)

It's a pest right now, but we do our best to keep the forum spam free. We'll get them all eventually.

I'll bet you money it's just 1 person. Notice the little flower on all the profiles. below the name and number of posts. Plus the amount of spammers is quite low, they just have so many algorithms in place to place their messages EVERYWHERE. This person has an algorithm in place to create profiles, and send spam messages.

[WhyYou]

Originally Posted by Max

I'll bet you money it's just 1 person. Notice the little flower on all the profiles. below the name and number of posts. Plus the amount of spammers is quite low, they just have so many algorithms in place to place their messages EVERYWHERE. This person has an algorithm in place to create profiles, and send spam messages.

Max...It is NOT just one person. The little flower you see is the icon for an ICQ number. There are MANY different IP addresses used from MANY different countries around the world. The current number of spammers is low because we Moderators have been working hard to block as many spammers as possible. Stop speculating about who the spammers might be. It will only make you go crazy.

[Anoree]

Originally Posted by Max

I'll bet you money it's just 1 person. Notice the little flower on all the profiles. below the name and number of posts. Plus the amount of spammers is quite low, they just have so many algorithms in place to place their messages EVERYWHERE. This person has an algorithm in place to create profiles, and send spam messages.

Originally Posted by WhyYou

Max...It is NOT just one person. The little flower you see is the icon for an ICQ number. There are MANY different IP addresses used from MANY different countries around the world. The current number of spammers is low because we Moderators have been working hard to block as many spammers as possible. Stop speculating about who the spammers might be. It will only make you go crazy.

There are also a couple of different style groups of spam, as well as certain other characteristics that distinguish the spamming groups. But you can keep your money, Max.

[mart]

Just a shame we can't simply ignore them, i try my best not to click their threads, especially the blantantly obvious ones. Hope nobody ever clicks on any of their links. Happy their never here for long, thanks to fast admin.

[Anoree]

Originally Posted by mart

Just a shame we can't simply ignore them, i try my best not to click their threads, especially the blantantly obvious ones. Hope nobody ever clicks on any of their links. Happy their never here for long, thanks to fast admin.

Some may linger longer than others. We try to delete them as quickly as possible, but some of us have to sleep and/or work, and unfortunately can't do both at once.

[Max]

Maybe we need one of those things that has to read scrambled letters before creating a new thread.

[Anoree]

Originally Posted by Max

Maybe we need one of those things that has to read scrambled letters before creating a new thread.

We have a thing where you need to read scrambled letters to register already, so I doubt that would be an efficient way to block the spammers. And about 10% of the spamming posts are put into existing threads, so that won't catch all spams anyway. The spammers would just quit creating new threads and flood our existing threads all the more.

[Max]

Originally Posted by Anoree

We have a thing where you need to read scrambled letters to register already, so I doubt that would be an efficient way to block the spammers. And about 10% of the spamming posts are put into existing threads, so that won't catch all spams anyway. The spammers would just quit creating new threads and flood our existing threads all the more.

Blocking some spam is better than blocking no spam, but I guess it's easier to clean up if it is just in a thread.

[Max]

They may already have several sockpuppet accounts already set up. Note how many accounts there are on the forum.

[WhyYou]

Originally Posted by Max

They may already have several sockpuppet accounts already set up. Note how many accounts there are on the forum.

The majority of the spammers show join dates very close to, or on the same days as, the spam that they posted.

[Max]

I've noticed that the spam rate has dropped, however, my computer logs me out quite frequently. What's going on here.

[WhyYou]

Originally Posted by Max

I've noticed that the spam rate has dropped, however, my computer logs me out quite frequently. What's going on here.

The spam rate has dropped because we have banned a lot of IPs as well as having several "instant kill" IPs listed.

I have no idea why your computer logs you out.

[WhyYou]

We now have moderation controls working. There will be little to no spam posted on the message board from now on. Some of the controls may seem like an inconvenience to new members, however after all the spam mess that we have experienced a little inconvenience is worth it.