how to stop spammers without using replacement variables

[amcd]

On our board we get quite a few spammers trying to drive traffic to their own site. We usually ban them or edit their posts to stop them but sometimes we get persistent characters who keep registering new ids from different ip addresses. In such cases we use replacement variables to change their site's url and that certainly discourages them immediately.

But the problem is that the list of replacement variables is getting quite long and I think it must be slowing down our server as well. Is there any way to achieve this objective without using replacement variables?

I saw a suggestion that we could add smilies with the offending domain name as the smiliy shortcut. That hides the url from view, but still leaves the url as a clickable link, and the url is visible by clicking 'quote'.

[bbqchef33]

i started getting hammered these past 2 weeks by spammers also. The replacment vars dont work becase he puts the link behind the text. So even the replacemnts still contain the hot link and the link still works. Any ideas around these guys trashing our boards?

[mefromspace]

same here...any way of denying links to be posted for a specific usergroup so new registred members cant post links until they get promoted to other usergroup?

[Ntfu2]

look for the hack that wont let users post images or urls without having atleast X amount of posts first

[bbqchef33]

great idea.!! Thanks

heres the hack.
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthrea...imum+posts+url

[amcd]

Originally Posted by bbqchef33

i started getting hammered these past 2 weeks by spammers also. The replacment vars dont work becase he puts the link behind the text. So even the replacemnts still contain the hot link and the link still works. Any ideas around these guys trashing our boards?

replacement vars will change the links no matter how they post them. I think you are confused between replacement variables and censorship or something else.

Originally Posted by Ntfu2

look for the hack that wont let users post images or urls without having atleast X amount of posts first

that is a good hack, thank you for the link

But i dont think it is the perfect solution as it stops new users from posting any links at all, which is not good. We have a hard enough time getting 'silent observers' to participate anyway.

99.9% of all domains are good and we have no problems if links are posted from those sites. We only want to block those websites which think our board is a good place to get free traffic from. Denying newbies from posting any and all links is not justified for 0.1% (or maybe even 0.01%) of domains.

And this does not stop anyone from spamming. It just adds to the initial time investment and makes it 10 minutes instead of 4. Earlier they could just register and spam, now they have to register, post x number of 'good' posts and then spam. Those first 'x' posts will only be 'good post' or smiley only posts and will only degrade the quality of the board.

[bbqchef33]

Originally Posted by amcd

replacement vars will change the links no matter how they post them. I think you are confused between replacement variables and censorship or something else.

yup, good call. I was thinking he meant the censorship keywords.

But i dont think it is the perfect solution as it stops new users from posting any links at all, which is not good. We have a hard enough time getting 'silent observers' to participate anyway.

99.9% of all domains are good and we have no problems if links are posted from those sites. We only want to block those websites which think our board is a good place to get free traffic from. Denying newbies from posting any and all links is not justified for 0.1% (or maybe even 0.01%) of domains.

And this does not stop anyone from spamming. It just adds to the initial time investment and makes it 10 minutes instead of 4. Earlier they could just register and spam, now they have to register, post x number of 'good' posts and then spam. Those first 'x' posts will only be 'good post' or smiley only posts and will only degrade the quality of the board.

Its a decent temporary solution or part of a tiered barrier. My spammer comes in, posts his spam and leaves to never return under the same id. He changes trhe last 4 characters of his ID on his next visit. Heres wwaht i did.

first, banned the class B subnet. Checked stuff out and he is the only one of 2000+ members coming from these subnets. I recognize i MAY be locking some others out, but the ban message states to contact me if they need assistance or feel wrongfully banned.

Second, installed this hack and set everything to 0 EXCEPT... set the minimum post count to posts links to 5. Its rare that a new members is posting links.. they usually hit our welcome forum and a few other plafes before they are comfortable enuf to start posting links.

Third, added his product names to the word censor so they get **** out..

Im hoping he just decides its to much hassle and goes away.

[amcd]

I found another plugin https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=109258

Let me install this and see how well it works