MAC address is very difficult as most webservers (I would guess in the high 99.9% here) dont have or allow access to p0f type tools to provide packet level inspection. MAC addresses arent all that unique as once youre removed the device manufacturer ID (which doesnt fill the full 24 bit), you only have a 24bit uniqie ID. There are a lot of network cards out there with the same MAC address and thats fine, just as long as there arent two with the same mac on the same subnet. Filtering on MAC therefore is a no-go area.

Th eonly way to stop automated bot register/post tools is to stop registration by means that the application doesnt know about, extra fields, simple questions, tick this box, click here serverside maps etc. Manual spammers is a different story, you just have to make it as hard as possible.

I agree, no solution will be 100% short of encroaching on impacting legitimate users.

For the record, I really like the notion of renaming register.php (obvious risks are third party mods which call that link directly(?!?!) and existing phrases that call it directly.. both manageable.

In that vein, modifying things in the page source like Generator Meta, etc. which specifically call out that you are running a VBulletin site.

That being said, hopefully you are:

1. Spending tons of time with the new child
2. Closing all feature adds for v7 (scope creep is addictive)
3. See #1

:-)

Did what you said, skipped your rant.

No more feature creep, I dont have the time. Maybe in a couple of months when I do.... Who knows but Ill keep your cookie/captcha idea in mind.

1. Oh yes
2. No more feature creep. Nothing new is going in, Im working on the last stages, data submission to stop forums spam.
3. See #1

:)

First of all, let me compliment you on your mod. I really like what you’re doing here. Also, congratulations on the new baby! I know that you are trying to keep the scope of the project from getting out of hand and that you also want to spend time with your family (which, I completely agree with)… But here is a suggestion that would be easy to add and would be a really nice compliment to the mod you already have. When you get a chance, take a look at Project Honey Pot (www.projecthoneypot.org). They have a list of known automated spammer ip addresses similar to the http://www.stopforumspam.com list, except the list is bigger, and probably less vulnerable to list contamination because of the way that the ip addresses are collected. Since they have an established api and sample code it would be really simple to have your mod query their data base in addition to the stop forum spam database.

Here’s a link to some sample code as well as some information about their api:

http://www.projecthoneypot.org/board...10&i=179&t=179
http://www.projecthoneypot.org/httpbl_api

I hope that you like the idea. Let me know what you think.

BINGO. You wouldn't believe how many spammers I've caught simply because they slapped URLs where it asks for their motherboard :)

Thank you, its really nice to hear positive feedback

Hmm, Im going to go look at this now and if the sample code can be added to the mod without too much trouble (which I hope is that case as I tried to make it flexible), then Ill most certainly add it.

Edit : Ive looked at this and it looks really really good. The code is small and can added very easily to my new code rewrite without too much trouble at all. As its DNS based, I dont have to worry about caching data ike I am with stopforumspam, its lightweight and should make the mod even more useful (to those that have actually installed it)

Cheers for this m8, starting using it yesterday and for the first time in 24hrs I have not got a single spammer ;)

Well Done, have some wine! hehe

I'm glad that you liked the honey pot recommendation. By checking both databases the mod should be even that much better at blocking spam.