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.

[vortodox]

Recently this plug-in started seeing anyone as a spammer... :S
Is there some problem with plug-in or what?
I mean even I can't register on my own forum... O.o

[edshuck]

I am misunderstanding something about the install process.
I unzip the package and get the upload, the xml and the install.
The install says to upload the upload "contents" to the root of the forum.

Does this mean that I should upload the file from the admincp and the file from the includes into the forum folder OR should I move the file from upload > admincp to the forum > admincp and upload > includes to the forum > includes.

If I upload the admincp and the includes on top of the ones already in the forum, won't that destroy the forum.

Like I say, i'm just confused.

I think that I am confused about what is root. Is that like this:

public_html > forum

public_html > admincp (from upload)

public_html > includes (from upload)

If it is, that would answer the question.

thanks

ed

[RTWAP]

Would it be possible to have the blocked ips automatically added to the Banned IP Addresses list?

Works perfect on VB 4.0.7.

[RTWAP]

Found a bug when sorting the logs by ip address:

Invalid SQL:

SELECT * FROM vbstopforumspam_log AS logs

ORDER BY ip ASC, date DESC
LIMIT 0, 15;

MySQL Error : Unknown column 'ip' in 'order clause'

Here's the fix:

Inside /admincp/vbstopforumspam.php:

Find:

switch($vbulletin->GPC['orderby'])
{
case 'ip':
$order = 'ip ASC, date DESC';
break;
case 'email':
$order = 'email ASC, date DESC';
break;
case 'username':
$order = 'username ASC, date DESC';
break;
case 'date':
default:
$order = 'date DESC';
}

and change like this:

switch($vbulletin->GPC['orderby'])
{
case 'ipaddress':
$order = 'ipaddress ASC, date DESC';
break;
case 'email':
$order = 'email ASC, date DESC';
break;
case 'username':
$order = 'username ASC, date DESC';
break;
case 'date':
default:
$order = 'date DESC';
}

Then find this line:

$headings[] = "<a href=\"vbstopforumspam.php?" . $vbulletin->session->vars['sessionurl'] . "do=view&pp=" . $vbulletin->GPC['perpage'] . "&orderby=ip&page=" . $vbulletin->GPC['pagenumber'] . "\">IP Address</a>";

and change it to this:

$headings[] = "<a href=\"vbstopforumspam.php?" . $vbulletin->session->vars['sessionurl'] . "do=view&pp=" . $vbulletin->GPC['perpage'] . "&orderby=ipaddress&page=" . $vbulletin->GPC['pagenumber'] . "\">IP Address</a>";

Works perfect now. Great add on by the way.

[BarelyHangingOn]

Can anybody help me? I just did a fresh install.

I don't have a link in the profiles any longer to submit data and I do have an api key.

[KW802]

Originally Posted by KW802

Attached is the vB4 version....

Attached is an updated copy of the postbit plugin. This will now open up the StopForumSpam.com site in a new window and you should now also see a confirmation screen instead of just "Data Submitted".

Plugin was done with vB 4.0.8, follow the instructions above for installing.

[BarelyHangingOn]

Originally Posted by KW802

Attached is an updated copy of the postbit plugin. This will now open up the StopForumSpam.com site in a new window and you should now also see a confirmation screen instead of just "Data Submitted".

Plugin was done with vB 4.0.8, follow the instructions above for installing.

That works fine but only if the spammer has made a post. It doesn't show up in user profiles of sig spammers etc.

Anyway to make it show up in their profile?

[tomarsyd]

Pedigree,
I had your mod on my 3.8 installation running great for the last year.
Over the past 2 weeks I've been doing my upgrade to the 4.0.8 release of vB and have been trying to get this mod to work. It is rejecting EVERYBODY, but seems to be doing so because of a communication error.

Result on field username - Unregistered [REMOTEERR] Unverfied and rejected by policy

I initially looked back at my 3.8 install and saw the same error so I thought nothing of it. But tonight I did a test registration myself and got the rejection message.
Result on field username - FlaFishin [REMOTEERR] Unverfied and rejected by policy

I then went to your site and checked my test username seen above and of course it is not listed there. So I guess it's simply rejecting based on that REMOTEERR, not the actual username.

I went back to my 3.8 logs and looked deeper and see that the StopForumSpam was working fine up until 11/17/2010 and then every inquiry since then fails with the above error message.

Please respond with some help!!!

[GlowHost.com]

Originally Posted by tomarsyd

Over the past 2 weeks I've been doing my upgrade to the 4.0.8 release of vB and have been trying to get this mod to work. It is rejecting EVERYBODY, but seems to be doing so because of a communication error.

Result on field username - Unregistered [REMOTEERR] Unverfied and rejected by policy

The error seems to say it all. Your "Policy" (AKA your Settings) are set to deny registrations when there is a communication error. So, the first problem is that you have a communication error with SFS. To alleviate the problem change your settings to allow registration if communication with stopforumspam.com cannot be completed. In the meantime, ask yourself why it is that you cannot longer communicate with SFS.

You might check out the GlowHost Spam-O-Matic mod which is supported. The StopForumSpam website shows that this mod is no longer maintained;

[tomarsyd]

Update:
First, thanks GlowHost for your input and response to my issue.

I'm posting my findings for anyone else who may come across this issue looking for answers.

I was up past 3am friday working on that issue. I was definitely aware of the policy which you mention, but to me, I felt like why do a spammer check if I was going to allow registration anyway. The issue for me was to figure out why it was erroring. It apparently wasn't that the SFS service was down.

Finally on Saturday I tested the CURL module and found that CURL had been disabled by my host ( but retained the ability to turn it back on) So I found where to do that and re-enabled it. Bingo! It works now.

So here's my issue with the plug-in (not really an issue, just something of note), if the code uses CURL, it should do a check to see if the CURL code is available and issue a LOG entry saying so. I'm a .NET developer and this is standard practice to log any kind of issue with remote calls.

At any rate, all seems to be well and it is properly turning away spammers once again.

I had installed Spam-O-Matic as well, but disabled because of the same REMOTEERR issue. So I may actually go and try it again because it has those extra features for submitting spammers via the admincp module.