[SOLVED] Attention forum admins - Spammers Have Landed

[toby]

It is not uncommon for an open forum to encounter spamming, probably from automated "users".
If you aren't careful, they will simply take over, drowning out all useful messages.

One tactic against them is to use CAPTCHAS, but that is a hassle
to all the normal users all the time.

What I think is better is to moderate new users - their posts
have to go through a moderator until they establish themselves
as legitimate. Of course, this is a hassle for the moderator(s)
and delays posts sometimes.

But if you don't do one of these things, or perhaps something else,
and they decide this is a good target, then what will happen is that
this forum will quickly be reduced to nothing more than a giant pile of spam, and
completely useless to the Union community. I have seen that happen,
and it's not pretty.

How to spot spam posts:
- no real content, but some innocuous text like "this is interesting stuff"
or similar, but their real "payload" is the link to their site which is included with it.

- another tipoff is a reply to a long abandoned thread such as this one
viewtopic.php?uid=146&f=3&t=243#p1070

Here is another post:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=361#p1069
Oh what a surprise, both of those have links to the same site.

This one looks like another:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=180&p=1064#p1064

This one is essentially the exact same format as post #1070 above:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=106&p=1049#p1043
(and posts following it on the thread are more of the same).
Notice how the destination site in the link is different, but except for that the format is the same:
In 1043: http: //www .DOMAIN#REMOVED.com/70-336.htm
In 1070: http: //www .OTHER#DOMAIN.net/DOMAIN-70-246.htm
(I added spaces so these wouldn't be treated as links.)

Believe me guys - this small number of spam "snowflakes" will grow to an avalanche
before you know it. You need to stop it sooner rather than later.

[colin]

agreed. i've changed permissions for "Newly Registered Users". they'll now require a moderator's approval before their posts are published on the forum.

thanks for bringing this to our attention toby.

colin