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Spam accounts
#1
It seems that spam accounts have been out of control today. I'm not sure what's changed, but when there are six pages of new posts, with one actual legitimate thread amongst them, we have problems. It basically makes the forum unusable.

There are probably a number of approaches to dealing with this. My suggestion:

As a start, make it so that by default new accounts cannot start new threads until they've posted in an existing thread. If spam in existing threads becomes a problem, make it so their initial posts need to be approved by a moderator. I'd suggest, as an option, those new users could PM a moderator to have their account upgraded immediately. The main intention is to weed out spam bots, not create a gated community.
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#2
Bug 
I know there wouldn't be Spambots if people didn't actually profit from them... but I struggle to see how disrupting a community with random wording makes me want to buy direct from a Canadian Pharmacy!  Huh

Anyway, there are some forums I have been on that only allow new users to post in a certain folder, and once approved by a moderator can post elsewhere.  Is that something MyBB allows, or will I just be making the "Mark this thread as read" button my new best friend?

Coke
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#3
We need to get these spam accounts blocked and deleted!
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#4
(07-18-2017, 09:04 AM)gomesjustin Wrote: We need to get these spam accounts blocked and deleted!

Hurry, someone get me moderator status... I'm ready to go to war!  Tongue

Coke
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#5
(07-18-2017, 08:10 AM)jamincan Wrote: It seems that spam accounts have been out of control today. I'm not sure what's changed, but when there are six pages of new posts, with one actual legitimate thread amongst them, we have problems. It basically makes the forum unusable.

There are probably a number of approaches to dealing with this. My suggestion:

As a start, make it so that by default new accounts cannot start new threads until they've posted in an existing thread. If spam in existing threads becomes a problem, make it so their initial posts need to be approved by a moderator. I'd suggest, as an option, those new users could PM a moderator to have their account upgraded immediately. The main intention is to weed out spam bots, not create a gated community.

Very reasonable imo.  I'm just looking now and my 'whats new' still has a spattering of spam posts in it.
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#6
(07-18-2017, 09:17 AM)REnerd Wrote: Very reasonable imo.  I'm just looking now and my 'whats new' still has a spattering of spam posts in it.

Tip: On the “What's New” page, click on the “Replies” column — real posts usually have replies and sort to the top.
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#7
MyBB allows registration security questions, which should help (spambots can decipher most captcha these days). But asking questions like these would likely foil the bots:
- What is the largest park in downtown Kitchener?
- What was Research in Motion's most famous product?
- What city is Hespeler now part of?

https://docs.mybb.com/1.8/administration/spam/
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#8
MyBB does have a setting whereby each user's first post is moderated. That would help but add more workload to the mods (I am not a mod so I can't judge whether it would be too much).

The other available option is registration questions, which would (should!) be hard for a bot to answer (I had some examples in the other thread).
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#9
Today's assault is really something.

And for some reason, the forum isn't giving us mods the usual tool "Purge Spammer" which auto deletes everything they posted in a single action. Cleanup will be a little slower.
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#10
Thank you for your hard work moderators!!
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#11
Yeah, thanks. That looked like a nightmare to deal with.
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#12
Hi everyone,  Just got on for the first time today just now and I see this.  Damn.  Anyways, we have an awesome mod team here who have been working their tails off to clean things up.  Things from a spam perspective haven't been great the last few months and have clearly gotten worse.  

We're going to take some action to try to remedy this.  

Right now it sounds like making a minimum number of posts to create a new thread is the best bet.  At quick glance it doesn't look like this is a standard feature for myBB (becoming a common theme).  I have some family commitments tonight but I'll keep looking.  

I'll also add a couple of security questions to registration to help.

The whole mod team is committed to fixing this.  Thanks for your support and hang in there.
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#13
(07-18-2017, 10:02 AM)tomh009 Wrote: MyBB allows registration security questions, which should help (spambots can decipher most captcha these days).  But asking questions like these would likely foil the bots:
- What is the largest park in downtown Kitchener?
- What was Research in Motion's most famous product?
- What city is Hespeler now part of?

https://docs.mybb.com/1.8/administration/spam/

Used all three of these great questions.  Fingers crossed this will help the problem
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#14
Awesome work, mods! Thank you for all your work to make this forum such a wonderful place!

I frequent this forum and the Canada section of SSP, and while the main reason I prefer this forum is because of it's local focus, I also greatly appreciate that the overwhelming majority of members here show greater respect and civility for one another.

Once again, thank you for all your terrific work.
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#15
(07-18-2017, 07:01 PM)Spokes Wrote:
(07-18-2017, 10:02 AM)tomh009 Wrote: MyBB allows registration security questions, which should help (spambots can decipher most captcha these days).  But asking questions like these would likely foil the bots:
- What is the largest park in downtown Kitchener?
- What was Research in Motion's most famous product?
- What city is Hespeler now part of?

https://docs.mybb.com/1.8/administration/spam/

Used all three of these great questions.  Fingers crossed this will help the problem

Thanks, glad I was able to help!  Smile
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