Why doesnt question and answer at registration stop spam registrations.

[BirdOPrey5]

Originally Posted by kh99

I don't know much about the licensing terms, but if you own a vb3 license doesn't that allow you to download the latest vb3 version?

No it does not. The VB3 license "expired" after a certain time, and if you did not pay the upgrade fee you are stuck with the latest 3.x version released on the day of expiration.

VB had a $50 upgrade promotion to upgrade all 3.x users to the latest 3.x version but as announced it was a limited time thing, they stopped it after a few months.

Today the only way to upgrade to 3.8,7 is to buy a 4.x forum license.

Also while your 3.6 forum MAY be being exploited (vb.org is 3.6) the vast majority of people who have spammers getting through the spam question is because of human spammers. They are paid minimal wages but all they need to do is sign up for forums all day and enter that data into a spam database that bots come in and post with later.

[kh99]

Originally Posted by BirdOPrey5

No it does not. The VB3 license "expired" after a certain time, and if you did not pay the upgrade fee you are stuck with the latest 3.x version released on the day of expiration.

My mistake - thanks for clearing that up.

[Pandemikk]

Originally Posted by manning

vBulletin has issues, period!

I'm sorry that you think vBulletin 3.6.9 has an exploit that allows spambots to bypass the registration problem and become a part of your member base in doing so.

But in reality, what's happening is you either have a simple question spambots have no problem getting answered or humans paid to spam in some sweatshop doing so.

Increase the difficulty of your Q&A or employ some other anti-spam protection.

[vbenhancer]

Originally Posted by manning

Yes, the forum is running the outdated version 3.6.9, but I'm not in a position to pay the upgrade hijack fee.

yeap... vBulletin has issues... and it looks like yours are way bigger and you can't face them so you put the fault on someone else... very funny. kid

the guys who registers and overpass the securities are paid kids who registers as humain, and post spam... there are more and more on the market, and it's not related to vBulletin.. go to http://community.invisionpower.com/ and you will see the same pattern... http://phpbb.com is the same.

bots are one thing... spammers are another topic.

and oh, yeah, i remember... bored members start spamming their boring forums as well...

[mike2902]

I still dont know why the question and answer system doesn't stop spam registrations. Im getting 50 per day and they cant be getting the question right. I have the question as a statement to send me an email via the contact us form at the bottom of the page and tell me how you found the board. I never get any emails and I still get 50 spam registrations per day even though they are not answering the question. Im running 3.8.7.

[kh99]

Have you tried changing the answer and seeing if that makes any difference? Have you looked at your web server logs to see if it looks like they are actually accessing register.php?

[BirdOPrey5]

Do you regularly change the answer? If one human got it they probably posted the answer to a spam database somewhere.

[mike2902]

Originally Posted by kh99

Have you tried changing the answer and seeing if that makes any difference? Have you looked at your web server logs to see if it looks like they are actually accessing register.php?

Changing the answer wont help. The "answer" is a random phrase that cant be guessed. I had registration off and within a minute of turning it back on I had spam registrations. Without the correct phrase that they would get by email my the registration shouldnt even process. But it does. Thats why im just going to change the registration closed phrase so they have to contact me if they want to join. The current system is a joke.

[kh99]

Originally Posted by mike2902

Changing the answer wont help. The "answer" is a random phrase that cant be guessed. I had registration off and within a minute of turning it back on I had spam registrations. Without the correct phrase that they would get by email my the registration shouldnt even process. But it does. Thats why im just going to change the registration closed phrase so they have to contact me if they want to join. The current system is a joke.

I was thinking that someone might have shared your answer with other spammers , and you could test that if you change it and registrations stop.

So you disabled registrations and they actually stop? Then they are going through the normal process. If you know even a little php you could make the registration script log the info its receiving and you could check to see if the answer is being provided or not. Again, not many sites are having your problem so there has to be some answer

[Pandemikk]

I don't understand...

You make a Q&A and get spambots signing up... You disable registrations... They stop. How exactly is it vBulletin's fault that your Q&A is so simple that spambots can sign up no problem?

Use reCAPTCHA or something. Stop blaming others for your own faults.