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the goat
03-07-2009, 07:29 PM
I am looking for advice on vbulletin spam. One of my forums is getting hit so fast I can't keep up with it. Is there a plug in or something out there like wordpress' option where it will catch a post with more than a certain amount of links in it?

vangogh
03-07-2009, 09:31 PM
By spam do you mean spammers registering? Is the idea you're looking to prevent them from registering.

Part of the problem is that captcha has been broken so it doesn't stop automated registration. I can't find it now, but there's a thread at the vBulletin support forums (I think it's there) about captcha and how it's better to use it in combination with the question thing you can set on the backend.

One thing you might try is the Cyb Advanced Permissions Based on Post Count (http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=177704) plugin. I downloaded it, but haven't set it up here yet. The idea is you can set a lot of permissions to only take effect after the member has posted a certain amount of times. Maybe you set it so they can't post a link until they've reached 10 posts. One danger with that is some people will create 10 useless posts just to reach the post level and you end up with 10 extra posts to delete. So be careful with that one.

Do you have enough members where you can make a couple or three mods to help with the spam? Ultimately it's all about people finding and banning the spammers.

the goat
03-08-2009, 06:13 PM
I do have the captcha and image options enabled, along with email confirmation. I am amazed that so many spambots get by the three, some bots even make avatars and signatures.

I am going to appoint a few moderators, and install the akismet plugin for vbulletin, hopefully it works as good there as it does on wordpress.

vangogh
03-09-2009, 12:15 PM
Let me know how Akismet works. If well I'll go ahead and install it here too.

customtollfree
03-13-2009, 04:07 PM
I do have the captcha and image options enabled, along with email confirmation. I am amazed that so many spambots get by the three, some bots even make avatars and signatures.

I am going to appoint a few moderators, and install the akismet plugin for vbulletin, hopefully it works as good there as it does on wordpress.

You may think they are spambots but they really are human spammers, just go ahead appoint a few mods to monitor your board.

vangogh
03-13-2009, 04:15 PM
Not all. Some of it is automated. What needs to happen to register and fill out some basic info is the same across sites so it can be automated. I agree though that some is human spammers filling in the information.

I get automated spam forum posts through the contact form on my site. Most of the spam I get through my contact form starts like:


I've been lurking here for awhile. Thanks for providing such a great resource. I recently came across (insert spammy link here) and thought it might help many of you. This company completely changed the way I do...

Real people could easily see my contact form is not a forum.

bizcard
03-24-2009, 08:21 AM
Aside from the captcha, image authentication and email confirmation, I saw in some boards that they allow you to solve a simple math problem like addition or subtraction during registration.

vangogh
03-24-2009, 12:27 PM
The simple math and other questions are another step in fighting spam. None of that really stops the non automated spam, but some can help fight the automated spam. Most of the tricks to fight spam eventually get broken by the spammers though.

If someone can automate a prevention then the spammers can automate a way around it. In the end your best defense against spam is real people.

janicejan
04-06-2009, 12:27 AM
Discourage spammers to join your forums, make new members post around 20 and they should be a member for a certain date before they can put on signature links, it's a good way to know who's real or who's not.

vangogh
04-06-2009, 01:21 AM
We may enforce a post limit in order to have a signature, but I've seen that lead to people making a lot of useless posts just to get the signature privileges. That only leads to more work for us cleaning up. Still we may require 5 posts before you can post a signature.

the goat
04-08-2009, 08:46 PM
So far nothing has worked, I have been forced to moderate all new member sign ups and simply can not keep up with it. I get 50-100 new sign ups a day and 10% of them are real. I am at my wits end.

vangogh
04-08-2009, 08:49 PM
Do you know it's different people. Odds are it's the same few registering multiple times. Look on the admin side to see if they're using the same email domain or if the signups are coming from the same range of IP addresses. If so you can block the email domain and the IP range.

I'd be willing to bet it's not 50-100 new people, but rather a few people signing up over and over again.

the goat
04-08-2009, 08:54 PM
I have tried banning IP ranges and have banned .ru .de etc. email domains. They still keep coming, I can't ban them fast enough, xmail.com, meltmail.com I see them all. A ton from gmail.com too, but I can't really ban that. I am at the point where I may just remove the forum from the site.

vangogh
04-09-2009, 12:33 AM
What version of vB are you using? If you want to PM me a link to the site I'll take a look and see if I notice anything.

bizcard
04-29-2009, 07:05 AM
So far nothing has worked, I have been forced to moderate all new member sign ups and simply can not keep up with it. I get 50-100 new sign ups a day and 10% of them are real. I am at my wits end.

That must be some spammers. I can't imagine dealing with 50-100 sign ups a day.

vangogh
04-29-2009, 11:50 AM
50-100 is a lot for one person to handle. I moderate a webmaster forum that probably gets as much if not more spam signups. We have a staff of about a dozen to moderate.