forum abuse

[thebeard]

I've noticed in the past year a host of forum abuse, spam-like posts, even within this forum. Is there a technical term for this abuse? Other than moderators working to keep the forum clean, is there any protection against this kind of thing?

[bobdog]

Not really, unless the admistrator has to sensor posts first. That would defeat the purpose of us talking and exchanging ideas and stuff.

Lately I've had a problem with spambots hitting my Wordpress forum. No matter what I do, they figure a way to get a post in there...but they don't get the satisfaction. I sensor all comments before it gets posted to the website. So nobody saw the unsavory posts about ****(fill in the blanks)

In a perfect world, poetic justice might be the best thing. Spam his mailbox till his head spins. See how HE likes it.

[charlesgan]

spamming is very common, and one way to prevent it is to have registered member that already had more than 10 (or more) reply, to start a new thread ... this will kick out most short term spammer

[thebeard]

Spambot. I suppose this is the correct term. I figured if there was a way to hamper them without disrupting the open flow of conversation BH would have implemented the proceedure. I've got a forum started for a youth group, as requested by two pastors, but I've been warning them about these things. They seem to think They can handle the moderating of it OK...we shall see.

maybe I'll turn on the admin must approve before post option. That should keep the kiddies safe.

[Maggilove]

Most bots use fake e-mail addresses, so turning on user activation will help. I have a phpBB forum with user activation enabled and the anti-bot question mod installed... to date, we have not had a single spammer get through.

[areidmtm]

A lot of the spambots we get here are the "smart" bots. These bots will read image verification and also verify the email address. So without completely locking out the forum and requiring users to have at least 10 posts, we will always have spam here. Locking the forum to people how have posted less then 10 defeats the purpose of this forum. I just delete the spam and block the user. It's really not that hard.