Oh, no !! F** spammers

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Bregalad
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Oh, no !! F** spammers

Post by Bregalad »

Looks like one automated spammer was able to create a recorded account : http://nesdev.com/bbs/profile.php?mode= ... 2e68539bb3
How is that possible ? Grrrrr
Useless, lumbering half-wits don't scare us.
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Quietust
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Post by Quietust »

Dozens of those accounts get created every day on this forum - they redirect the captchas to websites where random users fill them in for free pr0n. Oddly enough, none of those accounts ever actually post anything.
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Bregalad
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Post by Bregalad »

If it may not be the first in the genre, I doube there actually is dozen of them everyday.
I hope you're right and they won't post anything, but in theory, they could post spam anywhere or even worse reply to decent topics with spam. I'm not too rassured with that idea.
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Memblers
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Post by Memblers »

There really are tons of them, there'd be times where 50+ fake accounts had registered in one day. I'd have to go through and delete them all. Thankfully they mostly use the same domains for their email addresses, I banned several of those and that cut down new fake registrations greatly.
tepples
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Post by tepples »

Are you still watching the spammers? Is there anything in common about the spammers whose posts I have moved to the mod forum?
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No Carrier
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Post by No Carrier »

Is there any way that you could have some time of image verification for new sign ups?

Something like this:

http://www.phpbbhacks.com/download/5338

Maybe it would cut down on the robo-spammers.

NC
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Dwedit
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Post by Dwedit »

This is totally a necrobump, make a new thread to discuss these issues.
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X-or
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Post by X-or »

It seems that those hundred (thousands?) spammers are currently mischiving on these boards. I have received a lot of notifications for replies that got deleted lately :roll:

Your spambot control check at registration is too poor. On my boards, I have installed a simple control based on random questions

ex:
Are you a robot or a human (reply 'robot' or 'human')
Are you a robot (reply 'yes' or 'no')
...
...

The result was drastical, no robot could no longer pass the registration succesfully anymore :roll:
gannon
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Post by gannon »

yep, modifying the registration form is an easy way to prevent many bots from coming in.
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Memblers
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Post by Memblers »

X-or wrote: Your spambot control check at registration is too poor. On my boards, I have installed a simple control based on random questions

ex:
Are you a robot or a human (reply 'robot' or 'human')
Are you a robot (reply 'yes' or 'no')
...
...

The result was drastical, no robot could no longer pass the registration succesfully anymore :roll:
I'm a total php newb, can you point out where I can find such a mod or can you share the code? It would help a lot.
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Memblers
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Post by Memblers »

Thanks for the mod info, gannon.

I just installed it, we'll see if it stops some of those little bastards. :twisted: I only modified the english and simplified chinese versions though, because that seems to be the language settings for all the spam users who's profile info I've viewed.

The Chinese registration page doesn't seem to have the visual confirmation / captcha thing. I guess that would be why spammers use that setting then? Wow, no wonder it was so useless.
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Memblers
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Post by Memblers »

Ladies and gentlemen, in the battle against spam the tide has finally turned. We've gone a few solid days without any spam posts (that I've seen) and definitely no new fake registered users.

Unless the thousands of fake users already registered spring into action (very, very unlikely except for a couple of possible hold-outs), I don't think we'll be seeing any more spam crap or ads anytime soon.

Everybody thank the moderators, tepples and (the vanished) Quietust for helping to keep the place clean in the face of the daily barrage of garbage.
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