Miscellaneous Hacks - NoSpam! - an alternative to CAPTCHA images

This hack is for vBulletin 3.6.x. For 3.5.x, please use the one provided in this thread. If you are using 3.7.x, you must use the one in this thread.

This simple hack is meant as a replacement for the default CAPTCHA system in vBulletin. There are two main reasons one might want to do this: firstly, new technology is constantly being developed to crack CAPTCHA images and make spam accounts anyway, and secondly, the more secure the CAPTCHA, the more difficult it is for genuine users to tell what the numbers in the image are. There is also the issue of visually impaired users, and the fact that not all servers are capable of generating CAPTCHA images.

So what does this hack do instead? It asks a question. Any question you want. That's the best part: YOU make up the questions, which means that every forum is unique, which means that it is impossible for spambots to be simply programmed to bypass it at all forums with the hack installed. You can make one or many questions - if you make many, the hack will pick one at random when a guest attempts to register, search, post or send mail through the Contact Us form. Their input is compared with your specified answer, and voil?, if they get it right they're pretty much guaranteed to be human. If they get it wrong, they're given an error message.

It doesn't have to be a complicated question. Heck, you can just make it "Please type 'blah' into this box." Or you can go with inserting a simple image with HTML and ask what is shown on the image. Or you can ask them to tell you two plus two. It's up to you. In fact, this can also be used as a means of forcing people to read the rules by asking for a certain password found there, or if your forum focuses on a specialized subject, ask a question concerning the subject that all your genuine users will be able to answer, but a random troll or "CAPTCHA-sweatshop-reader" will be scratching their head over.

It's simple to install, too: just one product to import, and that's it.


VERSION HISTORY:

3.0: Added functionality to allow users to specify which pages should use NoSpam!.
2.0: Extended the NoSpam! functionality to guest posts, guest searches and guest "Contact Us" in addition to registration.
1.1: Made template edit automatic (with thanks to Cole2026), added ability to have more than one answer to each question, and made answers case insensitive. To upgrade, I recommend undoing the template edit so you won't have to worry about it anymore (replace $nospamfield in the template register with $imagereg, or if you added $nospamfield above $imagereg, just remove $nospamfield altogether), and then reimport the product through the Admin CP (making sure that Allow Overwrite is set to On).
1.0: Initial release.


INSTALLATION:

Please download NoSpam!.zip, not product-nospam.xml, for the tested version. product.nospam.xml is NoSpam! 4.0 adapted blindly to 3.6, i.e. by editing the XML file for the 3.7 version without actually testing it on a 3.6 board. Theoretically it should work, but I cannot guarantee it at this time. If you download NoSpam!.zip and unzip it, it will contain another file called product.nospam.xml, which you should use.

1. Import product-nospam.xml through the Admin CP product manager.
2. Go to your vBulletin options in the Admin CP and select NoSpam! Settings. Once there, turn the system on and input your questions and answers according to the instructions there.

The system should now be functional and running.


UNINSTALLATION:

Just uninstall the product through the Admin CP.


SUPPORT:

Full support will be given here in this thread. All suggestions are welcome.

Thank you and please click "Mark as Installed" if you like it.


If NoSpam! is not working for you or you are looking for something a little different, you might want to check out Advanced Textual Confirmation.

[gg_luna128]

How I can integrate this hack with the mobile skin from Mobile Device Style Assignment?

[Saviour]

Originally Posted by Quantnet.org

works fine on mine

Did you have to do any editing...because, try as I may...I can't get the image to display.

I use Form Hack 4.0 and have made the integration changes. The form I want to use it on is not named "form"...it's named something else.

I also had the No Spam settings enabled - "Yes" and also enabled for guest posts.

The form I'm using is a link submission form I generated and allows all but Banned usergroups.

Needless to say...when installed...no question is displayed, but when I click submit on a blank form...I see the No Spam error message, but it doesn't conform to the rest of my forum pages.

I give up!

[lostgirl815]

Originally Posted by gopherhockey

When I first installed this hack the bots were done instantly.. 4 days passed without a one. Now they are back again. My guess is that they have figured out a way around this.

What kind of questions are you asking? That might matter. I'm sure by now they can be programmed to reply "four" when the question is "what's two plus two" or to type "four" when the question is, "type the word four."

I change my questions from time to time anyway, but none of them have the answer in the question and I haven't gotten a single bot registration that I'm aware of. And when I first started out I was getting about ten an hour. (Don't even know how they found me.)

[Saviour]

Originally Posted by mini2

Installed on 3.6.7

Didn't work at first, needed to manually edit (otherwise unfettled) templates.

What edits did you make?

I use 3.6.7 PL1 with Form Hack 4.0 and have not been able to get this to work correctly. I can't get the question or the field to display.

I have Form Hack configured to allow all but Banned usergroups, so my form will be available to all who visit the form.

Once this hack is installed and you click "Submit" on a blank form, No Spam does try to validate the question and returns an error page that doesn't conform to the rest of my forum pages as far as style is concerned. ..just the error message text on a white background with a couple of navbar links.

Any help is appreciated...I don't have much hair left

Didn't have much to begin with...

[spankaveli]

i installed this on 3.6.5 and it's working beautifully!

[PoetJA-1975]

I need to turn off NoSpam for guest searches - Anyway to do that?
I've recently put up a search form like vB.org - so it's necessary that the search go through instead of going directly to the NoSpam error page.

Any help appreciated = Thanx!

Jacquii.

[PoetJA-1975]

Nevermind... Upgraded to version 3 of this brilliant mod!
Thanx very much

Jacquii.

[spgoldman]

Originally Posted by gopherhockey

We have a question in our registration process that asks for a Biography... bots are always answering "Man" to this question. Humans either skip it or enter random stuff.

When I first installed this hack the bots were done instantly.. 4 days passed without a one. Now they are back again.

My guess is that they have figured out a way around this. That or they are flat out guessing the answer to my quesitons, which I doubt. Or, these are humans who are using automated software to help the registration process (like autofill) so they are able to actually see the question and answer.

At any rate, it went from about 6 a day to 0 in 4 days (post install) to about 6 just today again. Bummer.

Just use same technique spammers use. Form questions with combination of numbers, words, spaces and characters. Make sure they are human friendly, but at the same time squeezes the sweat out of the spammer, for example, twentyeight 'p lus' eight "minu s" 9 =...
make sure you have plenty of questions without dup answers. They need to be a numeric value, so users don't have to guess the format.

[Quantnet]

Originally Posted by Saviour

Did you have to do any editing...because, try as I may...I can't get the image to display.
I give up!

I had this working since 3.6.4
I upgraded to 3.6.7PL1 and it's still working...i haven't checked since.

Asides from a few human spammer, i have ZERO bot since installed this.

[nervous]

Thanks for this hack.installed!!