Changing Email Boiler Plate to Avoid Scammers
 

We are having a problem with users scamming other users. Basically if there is a user XYZZY that is trusted we get people creating accounts with names like 'XYZZY' and using the internal email system to gain trust from the person receiving the email. Our moderators are constantly watching for these accounts and banning them, but they are coming faster and faster. Suggestions for dealing with them would be welcome, but in the meantime we'd like to change the text that is included in an email sent from one user to another.

This is what is currently sent:

**********************************

This is a message from <user> at <forum> ( <forum url> )....blah, blah, blah.

To email <user>, you can use this online form:
<forum url>/se...ember&u=<usernumber>

OR, by email:
mailto: <real email address>

This is the message:

<message from user>
******************************************

I would like to change things so that it says:

This is the <forum> profile for this sender:
<forum url>/members/<usernumber>/

You can contact <user> through the Profile Contact Info above (suggested) or by replying to this email sent from <real email address>.

Any help would be appreciated.

Have you tried this?
ACP -> Settings -> User Registration Options -> Illegal Usernames

You can add XYZZY to the list and then any new accts using it won't be allowed
like: 123XYZZY or 123XYZZY456, etc.

the setting won't affect any currrent accts. using it.

Edit : sorry above settings are a VB4 option - not sure if same in VB3
Edit2: looks like vB3 also has Illegal Usernames too

I found a whole bunch of fake accts using names like forumadmin, forummoderator, root etc. in a server before adding to them to the list

Go to Languages & Phrases > Search in Phrases and search for part of the phrase, like "you can use this online form". That should find the phrase named usermessage, which you can edit and provide a translation (it's called a translation even if you just want a different phrase in the same language).

Thanks, that might work. The format won't be exactly right, but perhaps I can work around that.

Regarding banning of usernames...there are simply too many and they are constantly changing for this to be effective.

Chuck

Why not turn off so members can't email each other but only pm each other