Forum Spammers

[urie]

I have noticed quite a few Spammers on this forum, I am a moderator myself on another forum can admin or mods not limit new members from posting external links untill they have made a certain amout of posts.
And by that I mean usefull posts not just ones to post count up so they can post links.

This site Stop Forum Spam http://www.stopforumspam.com/search can be quite usefull for checking members email address and IPaddress to see if they are known spammers plus you can report spammers you find on there to add them to the database. Just checked one member I reported earlier results

24-Feb-18 13:23 39.53.240.151 Sharon Joore [email protected]

Already in the database

 

[Nigelar]

I am reporting each and every spammer to admin. However, I don't have the admin rights to ban them. I would say that around 95% of new forum members have been spammers since i started my reporting exercise in January. I probably report upwards of 15-20 spammers a day.
Often there is a delay between reporting them and admin deleting them and they will post during that period. Many spammers post overnight and of course many of us are in bed then!
As you suggest, I use "stop forum spam" as one of my checks.
Some of the spammers or spambots often post their spam web site in their user profile web address. Often that is enough for them as search engine index engines index them which means they get whatever payments they are due.
Other spammers use very similar user names with some variation. For example we are getting spam from members named n.gravitt32 where "n" is a random combination of letters.
It should be possible to trap many of these people with some kind of filter or at least insist that some questions about why they want to join the forum are answered. It may discourage some valid users but may help stop the spammers or the spam bots.
Over to you admin @Dave C .and @8bitDev.

 

[urie]

I know how you feel constant battle as I mentioned I am a mod on MDL signature spammers used to be the worst but now we do not allow signature links to external sites unless approval is given and there are spam filters in place but as you know they can't catch everyone

I also don't have full admin right but I can ban members no problem doing that with spammers but normal members warnings are given temp then perma ban usually after discussion with other mods we can have different opinions on the situation. And yes lots of members think we get paid don't realise we are volunteers. Any going off subject keep up the good work.

 

[Dave C]

The past few weeks have seen a lot more spammers than usual. We are catching a lot of them but some do still get through. I will look into what we can do to prevent more.

 

[urie]

Cheers Dave C, just trying to help I know it can be hard.