Anti-Spam Options - vbStopForumSpam

vbStopForumSpam

Mod of the month winner October 2009.... That cant be bad :up:

Apologies in advance, this is a copy of the 3.6/3.7/3.8 mod that has been verified to work in 4.0 (its so that I dont get a billion PMs asking if it works in 4.0)

This provides access to a RBL type system for forum admins, listing known spam IP / email / usernames. The RBL database is provided by www.stopforumspam.com. You do NOT need an API key from the website in order to access the database. only to submit data if you should wish to do so.

At the point of user registration, the mod checks if the IP number / provided username / email addresses appear on a block list and can block the registration.

Whilst this isnt the most perfect way to stop all forum spam, its another step that spammers have to overcome.

What it does

It checks with a remote database of known forum spammers. Their IP number, email address and forum username are tested and based on your configuration, you can reject / log / accept user registrations based on what you get back.

This version doesnt have
- whitelisting or the ability to submit users to the database but it will within the next week.
- automatic user deletion / post / PM purging. There are good tools out there already, this does something else.

Instructions are included in the installation.txt file - PLEASE read it first and dont forget to actually upload the files in the upload folder, otherwise it WILL kill your registration progress and you wont see the log file options in admincp.

Changes to vB
- 3 new database tables
- 2 database table alternations
- No new templates.
- 2 Hook (register_addmember_process & register_addmember_complete)

Ive tested it but had feedback that it works with versions as old as 3.6.2... Support should go back to older versions, as long as they have hook support for register_addmember_process / register_addmember_complete

For code to submit spammers to the database, check this post for code changes
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=288

Reported to work
- 3.6.1, 3.6.2, 3.6.9, 3.6.10, 3.7.0, 3.7.1, 3.7.2, 3.7.3, 3.74, 3.80, 3.81, 3.82, 3.83, 3.8.4, 4.0beta3, 4.0 Gold, 4.2pl1,2

Installers should remember to refresh their ACP navigation window when they first install it so they can see the new log file menu item.

REQUIRES MySQL 4.1.1+

There is a small mod, coded by Wired1 that will allow you to submit spammer details to the database from the admin control panel, here https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=289 This relies 100% on javascript being enabled and makes no tests that it is enabled.

You need to have an API key from www.stopforumspam.com in order to submit data, its free and easy to get... You DONT need an API key in order to use this mod however, only to submit spammer data.

Issues are
- The usergroup permissions / view details etc DONT work. I jumped the gun and put the permissions controls in there before I put the code in. Please delete the includes/xml/bitfield_vbstopforumspam.xml file and rebuild your postbit

Installation
- Follow the instructions in the zip file, that includes the file upload the correct folders.

Please click Installed

The original thread is at https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=176481 where there is a wealth of knowledge about the mod, please ask questions in there.

[RichieBoy67]

Great mod but it is a shame it blocks facebook registrants. This is a great way to obtain new traffic..

I will see if it is only the one click registration that is being blocked or is it the url, email or ip's that are being blocked?

There has got to be a fairly easy way to make an exception to allow Facebook users to register..

Great mod though besides that one issue..

Rich

[GlowHost.com]

We have a plugin that does the same functions as this plugin available on our site right now.

Its been modified a bit to work with vB4 and facebook as well as other enhancements.

If you want to give it a week we have version 1.0.3 which we will be posting on vbulletin.org that has some additional functionality including Akismet integration, and auto submission to both SFS and Akismet services, and automatic moderation based on certain admin-defined criteria.

We are running the newer version now on our live site, and it seems to be working fine.

If you want the functions of this Stop Forum Spam plugin but with Facebook functionality on vBulletin 4, you can find it here:
http://glowhost.com/forums/blogs/mat...orum-spam.html

Version 1.01 and 1.02 were internal releases that were not stable.

Version 1.0.0 and version 1.0.3 are the stable versions. I will update this thread when v 1.0.3 is released in the next week.

[maipoman]

Thank you, GlowHost. I'll give your product a try!

[GlowHost.com]

Hi Maipoman, sure thing. Actually we released a new version today on vBulletin.org that has some additional functionality. Enjoy!

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...t=Spam-O-Matic

[KissOfDeath]

this isn't working correctly it's denying innocent people as well, i get 200 - 500 registrations per day i receive about 20 = 30 emails per day from people that have been denied registration, i tried to re-register my self and it denied me, 4 times out or 5 on the same ip address....

True it does stop the spam bots but it you also lose some members because it denies them when it shouldn't

I'm not taqlking about the facebook loggins either i don;t have that enabled on my forums

[GlowHost.com]

Do the logs say why you were banned?

[howard007]

Hi,

This really is the best spam stopper for users, but it is still blocking legit users ie: aol etc.

Is there anyway you can add a whitelist for IP's that users send me? I'm in a tough situation in that I need to be able to allow access to legit subscribers.

Thanks!

[boggseric]

Just an fyi...

Originally Posted by pedigree

I recently update the stopforumspam.com website. some one has reported that this broke the postbit reporting. It hasnt but when you submit, there is no page or response. The data goes into the database just fine and Im working on a method to report this back without breaking anything else.

On a side note, is there a way to move the submit to stopforumspam section in the admincp to the top of the row rather than the bottom?

[Liquid1ce]

is there a way to display total spambots that have been blocked to display on the forum page ?

[bandare]

I've had a huge issue with this plugin. We launched a new site last week and it was running great before. However, when we started to get people coming to visit, after an hour I was getting constant emails to tell me that:

mysql_connect() [<a href='function.mysql-connect'>function.mysql-connect</a>]: User blah_blah already has more than 'max_user_connections' active connections
/home3/blah_blah/public_html/website/includes/class_core.php on line 313

What the plugin was doing was causing too many consecutive queries through the database at one time. As soon as I disabled the plugin, it was fine again.

My host allows for 15 simultaneous queries at one time to the database.