Spam-spam-spam!!

[shimpaku]

I’m not at all sure if this is the proper place to post this question but, nothing ventured, nothing gained and perhaps there are others with the same problem.

I used to be a moderator on a site for some time that eventually went down. We used to get the occasional spammer from time to time but nothing at all too problematic. When this site went down I started my own back in October of ’07. I started out getting the occasional spammer but then it eventually became a nightmare! I and my two moderators could hardly keep up the banning and deletions. I finally made it so that every new registrant had to have administrative approval before being able to become a member.

Well, that certainly alleviated the spam on the site but I still get approximately 8 to 16 spammers a day trying to get on! As I said, there was never anything remotely like this on the other site that I was a moderator on. Each day I deal with people that have insane user names, and ridiculous locations. I’m just glad I made the location a mandatory field to become a member as it helps me to spot these numerous idiots. Why is my site such a spam magnet? Has anyone else had to deal with this and is there anything I can do to try and at least bring this problem down just a few notches? I don’t mind the occasional spam as its only part and parcel of a forum site but this has gotten to be a virtual plague!

It seems as though other forum sites still have the automated registration and log in in for new members as I used to have and are having no such problems. If I still had it set up that way my entire site would be nothing but porn and Viagra! What the hell is going on here and what steps can I take to bring it down to a more manageable matter and get back to not having to give every new member administrative approval as was on the other site and from what I can see, on just about every other forum site? I'm in the midst of creating another forum site (totally different subject matter) and so it is of course closed. I'd really like to also have it as automated registration but I'm afraid I'll run into the same problem. Help......!

~Phil