? blocking specific countries

[b3zra1y]

I know this is not a question specific to vBulletin - but I'm looking for the most efficient way to ban user registrations from certain countries (e.g., Russia, Poland, Romania, China).

I can get a very long list of IP addresses for these countries, but I'd like to find the most succinct list by which to ban countries as a whole in the 'User Banning' options area.

for example...
61*
69*
116*
121*
123*

Can anyone point me to the best way to do this ?

THANKS

--------------- Added [DATE]1341331640[/DATE] at [TIME]1341331640[/TIME] ---------------

Can anyone help with this ?

[b3zra1y]

Ok, I've created a list of partial IP addresses for the countries I want to ban from the site (e.g., Russia, Ukraine). The reason for banning these countries is that I'm getting a lot of bogus new user registrations from them.

Here's an example of the list I have.
But the list for Russia alone is 946 entries.

62.5*
62.16*
62.32*
62.33*
62.61*
62.63*
62.64*
62.68*
... and so on

Is this the best way to fulfill my requirement ?
Or does vBulletin provide a simpler way ?

HELP !!
THANKS

[montsa007]

Go to this website http://ipinfodb.com/ip_country_block.php and follow the on screen instructions, should help.
Generate the htaccess file and add the code in your htaccess.

Also block Lithuania, Romania, Hong Kong and China (The most horrible bots reside there)

But its not bulletproof, these bots can come to your site via a proxy.

I find the Vbulletin's inbuilt blocker useless, there is a plugin called 'stop forum spam', something like that which once added blocks the bot registrations in real time (it checks the ip of the bot with a huge database and saves heck load of work)

[b3zra1y]

Thanks !
I run on a shared server at my hosting provider, so I don't think I can modify the .htaccess file.
Is that a showstopper ?

I saw stopForumSpam, and will install.

[DirtRider]

You should be able to change the .htaccess file with no problems. Have a look in your root and if there is not one just create one. However I found when doing china and those countries you end up at times blocking OZ an NZ

[nhawk]

Banning the way you're thinking of doing is never a good idea. You will end up banning countries you don't want to ban. Some examples from your last posted list...

62.5.0.0 to 62.5.127.255 = United Kingdom
62.16.128.0 to 62.16.255.255 = Norway
62.32.0.0 to 62.32.15.15 = Switzerland
62.32.15.16 to 62.32.15.31 = United Kingdom
62.32.53.0 to 62.32.53.31 = United States
62.61.64.0 to 62.61.127.255 = Finland
62.63.192.0 to 62.63.255.255 = Sweden
62.68.64.0 to 62.68.67.255 = Greece

The list goes on and on.

IP addresses always move around. Even if you use the current list from the link posted above. You have to periodically update the IPs or you'll lose countries because of IP moves. The only good way to ban countries is to have GeoIP installed on the server and kept up to date. You'll get between 99.5 and 99.8 percent accurracy using GeoIP.

[viper357]

What about this website http://www.trafficcleaner.com Is anybody using it or got anything good or bad to say about it? Also, will it have any effect on server load? Thanks.

[qpurser]

Maybe this MOD might help. It is supposed to work on 4.x also

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=205044