Major spam today

[user_not_found]

Me I deleted around 15 accounts in 2 day I never had too many spam before very curious.
Also captcha and email verification is enabled only for email verification I had 10 users... who tried and never confirmed their email

[v12kid]

just deleted 50 accounts from this morning, had to turn on recaptcha and turned on moderate new members in hopes to slowing them down. I did some random ip checks and they all turn to the former soviet republic.

[puertoblack2003]

I'm curious is this a random thing that occurs? or the site contents that attracts them.?

[fatal1980]

The captcha for most forum software has been cracked and no human intervention is required.

http://www.seopedia.org/spam/blackha...ming-software/

[noppid]

Anyone can install Stop the Registration Bots and make this problem go away.

Speaking of going away, I'll be gone all weekend and never worry about spam once. Have a great day!

[AtoZ]

I've had to delete/ban at least 100 accounts since Oct. 1. I discovered the ones I deleted came back with the same username and/or email address so I've had to switch to banning them. Most of them are using gmail and they are confirming their accounts (as it's required). I've never had a problem like this in the 7+ years of forum administration.

What I've found extremely helpful is the Check4Spam mod. It is set up to block links in a more sophisticated way than any other mods I've used. There is also a keyword filter that will send posts to moderation if they are triggered. It works beautifully. Only a couple of posts have gotten through and they didn't have any links or obscene/pharmacy keywords in them.

One thing I don't have is the Q&A... I think I'm going to try adding that to see if it cuts down on registrations getting through. It's time consuming enough to have to go through and ban the accounts. They are posting their links in one of the user profile fields so I feel like I need to get rid of them even if they aren't able to post anything.

--------------- Added [DATE]1223065030[/DATE] at [TIME]1223065030[/TIME] ---------------

Originally Posted by noppid

Anyone can install Stop the Registration Bots and make this problem go away.

Speaking of going away, I'll be gone all weekend and never worry about spam once. Have a great day!

Thanks for the tip! I'm hoping there is something similar for 3.6 because I haven't upgraded yet.

[okhissabigfish]

killing me here too...one every 7 minutes... any help anywhere?

[noppid]

Thanks for the tip! I'm hoping there is something similar for 3.6 because I haven't upgraded yet.

I use it on 3.6.11 PL1. It should work fine.

I updated the mod description to reflect this.

[AtoZ]

Originally Posted by okhissabigfish

killing me here too...one every 7 minutes... any help anywhere?

Did you read the whole thread? The 2 posts right before yours recommend two good mods to help alleviate this problem. (Check4Spam and Stop the Spam Bots)

--------------- Added [DATE]1223069346[/DATE] at [TIME]1223069346[/TIME] ---------------

Originally Posted by noppid

I use it on 3.6.11 PL1. It should work fine.

I updated the mod description to reflect this.

Thanks for that! I am installing it now. I am always thankful that others have come up with these solutions before I have to worry about them. :up:

I had installed isBot in the mean time and while it has blocked some, others have gotten through. It looks like it will be easy to circumvent.

[alpine spirit]

Here is what I did on my board... from Vb.org I think it was

How to add an extra registration question to frustrate human-assisted bot registration?

AdminCP -> User Profile Fields -> Add New User Profile Field

Profile Field Type: Single-Line Text Field

Use the following information when creating the Profile Field:
Title: Can you spell?
(Note: Adjust the title to the question you want to ask)
Description: Enter the first character of the word "Monkey"
(Note: Adjust the question. Don't use this example as it would be quickly picked up by bot registrations)
Default Value: B
(Note: anything but a valid answer)
Field Required: Yes at registration
Field Editable by User: Only at registration
Private Field: Yes
Field Searchable on Members List: No
Show on Members List: No
Regular Expression: ^[mM]$
(Note: this expression would only allow a 'm' or 'M' as valid answers, adjust to your needs)

This is not a fool proof solution, but will probably limit the number of semi-automated registrations.

FYI.. It killed the bots (50 a day), its been almost 36 hours and no spammer registrations, 3 legit registrations.