[Slade]

The attacks are all the same type of message, always 3 posts in three different forums. They're bots. Maybe assholes set up the bots, but they aren't human, themselves.

Nate says that the hardware that's running the forums can't accommodate the database upgrade, and it dies in the middle of said upgrade, so we're stuck until they get new servers, or the forum code is written to run on lower specs.

[Gobbler]

A hardware issue... ? Oh well...

... so what's the plan, should we barricade ourselves or donate some good servers or... or... ?

[Slade]

I'm planning on shooting a window near the middle of the forums so that the change in air pressure creates a vaccum which will suck all of the bots out of the forums.

Only allowing personal confirmation of users with valid e-mail addresses before they are approved to post will probably help if that's possible...

[Spoon Poetic]

I thought the forums already did that? Like, it sends out a confirmation link to your email before you can post.

[Chefelf]

The important thing to remember is that the battle between spam and anti-spam always goes back and forth. One side gets the upper hand and then it switches again. There are a few other options to explore as far as getting the spammers to stop. I'm going to try something soon.

We have email validation and have for quite some time. There's a few other failsafes in place but the spammers always find a way around this.

The most important thing to remember is just not to get upset about it. It happens. Don't take it personally when there's a spam message on the site. The spammers, largely, do not care or ever visit the site again. Just report them as you see them and they will be removed.

[TheOrator]

I've noticed nearly all of the spambots put 'USA' or 'US' for how they found this site.

Probably not very helpful, but hurrah for powers of observation!

This post has been edited by TheOrator: 07 February 2007 - 07:51 PM

[Gobbler]

That's the preselected country by default, if I remember correctly. But yeah, hurrah for observation stuff!

[TheOrator]

No, you see, not for their country, but in the "How Did you find this Site?" box. So no real person is likely to put that there. Just a thought.

EDIT: Changed M to N...(And checked the whole deal this time)

This post has been edited by TheOrator: 08 February 2007 - 10:14 PM

[J m HofMarN]

I too am opposed to spammers.

[Chyld]

[J m HofMarN]

:ninja: *slices throat while you look up so that you can die before you even know you've been killed* teach you to threaten my post count.

[David-kyo]

Anyway, wouldn't one of those nifty "copy these letters and numbers in a picture to this box here so we can avoid bots signing up"-feature help the situation or would it be managable to install it?

[Chefelf]

Anyway, wouldn't one of those nifty "copy these letters and numbers in a picture to this box here so we can avoid bots signing up"-feature help the situation or would it be managable to install it?

We already have one. Invision 2.2's CAPTCHA is supposedly more advanced but, like everything, it's only a matter of time before the spambots figure out a way around it.

The current bandaid on the problem seems to have stopped spammers for the moment.

[Slade]

Aargh. That bandaid gets in the way of me editing my profile, and I refuse to stoop to having to implement anti-spam protection on my account to have it display so unsightly. So I'm just not going to change my title, I guess.

Edit: Nevermind. I found a work-around due to me being a head moderator.

[Spoon Poetic]

What are you talking about, Slade? I just looked at the changing profile thing, and changed my profile (though without changing it) and there wasn't anything different.