Administrative and Maintenance Tools - Stop the Registration Bots

Stop the Registration Bots for vBulletin 4.2.0 PL3 and up.

This mod will check the the time it takes for a vBulletin registration form to be submitted. If the form is submitted faster then humanly possible, the registration will be denied and the admin contact can be emailed about the event.

First we will add a custom hidden field with a hash. Second we will insert a randomly named hidden field with a random value. This should make it a bit difficult to program a bot since the field names on all sites will be different as well as the values.

Time stamps to check the time spent on registration submission are stored in a DB table and private.

Installation is very easy.
Template edits.
Files to upload.
Product xml file to import.

Backup your database before any install or upgrade.

To upgrade from 2.x to 4.0.2, remove the existing Stop the Registration Bots product in the ACP and then follow the installation file instructions.


History

4.0.2
Added 10 minute delete interval
Fixed bug in part 3
updated table query
removed old hook code from product.

4.0.1
modify phrase vars
modified install instructions for 4.2.0 pl3 templates.

4.0.0
modified to work with vB 4.x.

2.0.2
Edited file includes/stb_reg_process.php
Added IP and Proxy IP to email notification.

2.0.1
Added tabindex="1" to input box template edit.
Fixed onsubmit code in input box template edit.

2.0.0
Conversion from vB 3.x version to vB 4.x
Reduced template edits to one.
Edited all arrays to include single quotes.
Removed ACP Setting StopBotReg_rulespage_hash
Removed Rules page instructions. All one page now.
Removed file includes/stb_reg_signup.php
Removed hook register_signup
Edited includes/cron/strb_cron_job.php Removed Rules page query.
Removed `rf_name` and `rf_value` fields from DB table.
Moved register_form_start hook code to register_form_complete hook
New Phrases
stop_reg_bot_please_wait
stop_reg_bot_seconds_more
stop_reg_bot_seconds_remaining
Removed phrase stop_reg_bot_enter_prereg_name
Removed phrase setting_StopBotReg_rulespage_hash_title
Removed phrase setting_StopBotReg_rulespage_hash_desc

[noppid]

Gonna try this on vB 4.2.0 PL3 today and will post any needed updates.

[Stefan118]

No need to update.....
I have installed this on vB 4.0.8 and it is ever since running.
Updated vB every time and running now without any problems on vB 4.2.0 PL3 since several months.

[MacGuyInNC]

In the second step, I think I see a typo in the instructions.

Under b) Find:
<input type="submit" class="button" value="{vb:rawphrase complete_registration}" tabindex="1" accesskey="s" />

You have:
Change to:
<input type="submit" class="button" name="timeremaining" value="{vb:rawphrase complete_registration} in {vb:raw vboption.StopBotRegMinTime}" tabindex="1" accesskey="s" onsubmit"submit_form()") />

The "onsubmit" is missing the =

[noppid]

Originally Posted by Stefan118

No need to update.....
I have installed this on vB 4.0.8 and it is ever since running.
Updated vB every time and running now without any problems on vB 4.2.0 PL3 since several months.

The instructions needed an update for 4.2 templates. The product name needed attention and the version check needed attention. You may want to just double check things. Thanks.

Originally Posted by MacGuyInNC

In the second step, I think I see a typo in the instructions.

Under b) Find:
<input type="submit" class="button" value="{vb:rawphrase complete_registration}" tabindex="1" accesskey="s" />

You have:
Change to:
<input type="submit" class="button" name="timeremaining" value="{vb:rawphrase complete_registration} in {vb:raw vboption.StopBotRegMinTime}" tabindex="1" accesskey="s" onsubmit"submit_form()") />

The "onsubmit" is missing the =

I just updated the zip with that fixed. Thanks for the heads up.

[MacGuyInNC]

Also, since I upgraded, I'm getting an error on the REPLACE statement:

REPLACE INTO stopbotsregistry (hash,rf_name,rf_value)
	values(
	'[Redacted]',
	'[Redacted]',
	'[Redacted'
	);

The MySQL error I'm getting is:

Unknown column 'rf_name' in 'field list'

The only columns in that table are:

hash, regtime, uf_name, uf_value

In the updated files, I'm seeing "rf_name" in 3 different files for a total of 8 instances. Also, "rf_value" appears in some of those files as well. Was there a database change that just didn't take? If I change the query to match the columns in the table, will that fargle anything up?

[noppid]

Somewhere along the line I think the upgrade procedure was to remove the product to remove the DB table and then re-install the product to create the new DB table.

The fix should be uninstall the product and re-install the product. Let us know it that works. There is no data in the table that won't be recreated.

[MacGuyInNC]

Originally Posted by noppid

Somewhere along the line I think the upgrade procedure was to remove the product to remove the DB table and then re-install the product to create the new DB table.

The fix should be uninstall the product and re-install the product. Let us know it that works. There is no data in the table that won't be recreated.

Yeah, in looking at my setup a little more closely, I noticed 2.0.2 was still installed.

Uninstalled, reinstalled, am waiting now to see if there are any problems.

Thanks for pointing out my PEBKAC moment.

[nicklfire]

Does this mod take into consideration the Facebook login feature as well?

[Toorak Times]

I have had this mod for a while, it has saved me so many hours work getting rid of spammers, when I have had it off after a crash et al I'd get flooded...JUST upgraded to 4.2pl3 and will be installing the upgrade tomorrow I hope.

I have had a few sneaking thru so it will be interesting to see how it responds, I will report back

[noppid]

Originally Posted by nicklfire

Does this mod take into consideration the Facebook login feature as well?

You should force the vB registration form on your forum to use this mod with FB or else you are relying on FB to give you real members.

This is designed to stop remotely submitted forms by installing random data fields in the registration form. It's one tool in the process of stopping spam.