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TheChemiKid
Hazard to Others
Posts: 493
Registered: 5-8-2013
Location: ̿̿ ̿̿ ̿'̿'̵͇̿̿з=༼ ▀̿̿Ĺ̯̿̿▀̿ ̿ ༽
Member Is Offline
Mood: No Mood
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Kitchens in England Spammer
Have you guys noticed that a lot of spam is about kitchens in England?
I feel like if admins could ban the guy's IP, spam might reduce.
When the police come
\( * O * )/ ̿̿ ̿̿ ̿'̿'̵͇̿̿з=༼ ▀̿̿Ĺ̯̿̿▀̿ ̿ ༽
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bfesser
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Threads Merged
26-2-2014 at 18:21 |
thesmug
Hazard to Others
Posts: 370
Registered: 17-1-2014
Location: Chicago, Il (USA)
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So much spam!
Have you guys seen this:
http://i.imgur.com/AUJSXtF.png
It's so crazy and it happens almost every day. (This question mainly for the moderators) Do you know of any spam filters for this kind of message? As
far as I know, they're always the same. Either about stilhaus kitchens or about nike shoes.
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elementcollector1
International Hazard
Posts: 2684
Registered: 28-12-2011
Location: The Known Universe
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Mood: Molten
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I always thought this could be easily rectified by something like the following at the registration screen:
"Type the second and sixth letters in: Hydrogen"
or
"What liquid covers 3/4 of the Earth's surface, and freezes into ice?"
These are questions that 99.99% of these spammers would not be able to answer, and most humans over the age of 5 can answer. I seriously cannot see a
downside to doing that...
Elements Collected:52/87
Latest Acquired: Cl
Next in Line: Nd
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Zephyr
Hazard to Others
Posts: 341
Registered: 30-8-2013
Location: Seattle, WA
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That is a good idea, but they already have the one where you have to type the jumbled letters, how do the spammers get around that?
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Oscilllator
National Hazard
Posts: 659
Registered: 8-10-2012
Location: The aqueous layer
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I understand that the captchas were originally designed to collect data to improve character-recognition software. Perhaps the programs are just good
enough to get past them now.
Those easy science questions sound like a good idea though!
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Zyklon-A
International Hazard
Posts: 1547
Registered: 26-11-2013
Member Is Offline
Mood: Fluorine radical
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Quote: Originally posted by Pinkhippo11  | That is a good idea, but they already have the one where you have to type the jumbled letters, how do the spammers get around that?
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If the spammers are real people, then they could get past it just as easily as you could, it's only made to stop non-humans.
A chemistry-specific question, however, could stop some people who are just advertising, but with the internet, ignorance is inexcusable,
they could still look up nearly any question, and have the answer within 20 seconds....
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Mailinmypocket
International Hazard
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Registered: 12-5-2011
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What if the first post a new user makes does not get displayed on the forum until a mod gives it the OK(if it relates to chemistry and otherwise non
kitchen counter related crap)? At that point the account would become active as normal... Like a one post probationary period.
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bfesser
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Threads Merged
28-2-2014 at 11:46 |
BromicAcid
International Hazard
Posts: 3244
Registered: 13-7-2003
Location: Wisconsin
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Is there anything else that can be done? I just clicked the "Who's online" button, you will notice there are 7 pages of 'people' online. I use the
term loosely because when I went through them, 85% of them were registering at the time. I assume they are all spam bots trying to auto-register.
Yes, it's great that we're not getting flooded considering how many spam bots are beating on our door but it's a frightening prospect that the flood
gates might open with just a step or two forward in spam bot programing.
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Texium
Administrator
Posts: 4580
Registered: 11-1-2014
Location: Salt Lake City
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Mood: PhD candidate!
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I'm rather confused, as it seems that this thread never came to a real consensus on how to properly report spam.
I've been reporting it and then posting a "spam reported" post. Is that the preferred way of reporting, or are we doing something else? It seems that
there are a lot of good ideas on this thread, but many of them are conflicting with each other, and none of them seem to be unanimously agreed on.
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Polverone
Now celebrating 21 years of madness
Posts: 3186
Registered: 19-5-2002
Location: The Sunny Pacific Northwest
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Please just send a spam report with "spam" in the body, but don't post in the spam-thread.
Please DO continue to report spam! I check the reports periodically and add people who make consistently good report to a special spam-handling
script. If two trusted users report a post as spam, the spammer, all his posts, and the reports are all automatically eliminated. Reporting spam so
that it is auto-deleted makes the job of the moderators a lot easier, since ordinary users can effectively run the spam patrol even if there are no
mods online at the time.
PGP Key and corresponding e-mail address
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violet sin
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nice. I use to type reported as well, but haven't for a while as no one else was. are we still only reporting the first spam post from a bot if they
make multiples? if we need 2 trusted members to report, and they pick diff posts by the guy, then it wont be eliminated right off.
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Texium
Administrator
Posts: 4580
Registered: 11-1-2014
Location: Salt Lake City
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Mood: PhD candidate!
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Alright, thanks. I will do that from now on.
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froot
Hazard to Others
Posts: 347
Registered: 23-10-2003
Location: South Africa
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Mood: refluxed
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I would suggest reporting the oldest post by the spam bot- that is the first post, that increases the chances of more approved reporters seeing it and
making it's visibility as short as possible.
Suggestions. Would it help if the board was only visible and browsable to logged in users? The way I see it, spam spiders search available text in
forums for keywords in order to select which ads to spam the board with. If they cannot see any text surely they would move on? The downside to this
is promoting the board itself but then again there are some topics here that we'd rather not have indexed in Google search.
Also, it might help to change the 'login' and 'register' links to something else like 'in' and 'get in' (for lack of something appropriately unusual)
which would throw the bot software. Maybe have an index page where one would see at least 4 links namely: Login, Register, In, Get in, where the login
and register links would send bots and humans to a page where bots would attempt to register for the rest of eternity and get nowhere but a piece of
text appears explaining to humans which link they should've used. Or if the bots succeed to register through the 'register' link they post in a
section that's invisible to humans and setup to auto delete every 24 hours.
Change the login and register url's to something non-standard.
[Edited on 25-3-2014 by froot]
We salute the improvement of the human genome by honoring those who remove themselves from it.
Of necessity, this honor is generally bestowed posthumously. - www.darwinawards.com |
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Texium
Administrator
Posts: 4580
Registered: 11-1-2014
Location: Salt Lake City
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Mood: PhD candidate!
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That sounds good in theory, but also like it may be slightly confusing to real people who want to register. For instance the "in" and "get in" should
fix the problem somewhat, but will probably also throw off or inconvenience some people, not to mention that it also sounds kind of sketchy.
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Chemosynthesis
International Hazard
Posts: 1071
Registered: 26-9-2013
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I just report all of them still on the forum. That way if I am added to the script, there is a greater chance of any of the posts triggering
elimination of the offender with just one additional vote. Probably too much effort to try to get the script to integrate a ratio of reported posts
to total posts, and it may be questionable to set an arbitrary threshold on non-trusted reports to eliminate someone.
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WGTR
National Hazard
Posts: 971
Registered: 29-9-2013
Location: Online
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I tend to report all of them too. That way there's no confusion about which post to report. Also, like Polverone said, don't post anything in the
spam thread. I could be
mistaken, but that may confuse the auto-deletion script.
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S.C. Wack
bibliomaster
Posts: 2419
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Location: Cornworld, Central USA
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| Quote: Originally posted by froot | | The way I see it, spam spiders search available text in forums for keywords in order to select which ads to spam the board with. If they cannot see
any text surely they would move on? The downside to this is promoting the board itself but then again there are some topics here that we'd rather not
have indexed in Google search. |
No need to promote the site at this point. If only there was a way to get the spammer to click on ads...
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Chemosynthesis
International Hazard
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I like the way you think!
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Töilet Plünger
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Posts: 66
Registered: 27-2-2014
Location: /root/
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Who is TessaMist? I keep seeing this bot logged in and changing its biography. It doesn't seem to be doing anything else, but it is promoting a
Twitter "robofollower" site - the kind celebrities use to make themselves more popular.
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Nicodem
Super Moderator
Posts: 4230
Registered: 28-12-2004
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| Quote: Originally posted by Töilet Plünger | | Who is TessaMist? I keep seeing this bot logged in and changing its biography. It doesn't seem to be doing anything else, but it is promoting a
Twitter "robofollower" site - the kind celebrities use to make themselves more popular. |
It is just a new type of spammers that exploit the fact that google and other searching engines index the member profile as well. If you check the
recently registered members list that have a WWW link in their profile, you will see that almost all of them are spammer accounts. They need not to
post anything, because their goal is to promote the URL of the site that pays them by increasing the google rating through spam indexation. At the
same time they are less intrusive than the old spambots, which means that they are less easily detectable and that their removal would require a
manual intervention (the antispam script cannot be used on them unless they post something). Their spamming is still parasiting the forum, but at
least it is not interfering with the forum quality.
…there is a human touch of the cultist “believer” in every theorist that he must struggle against as being
unworthy of the scientist. Some of the greatest men of science have publicly repudiated a theory which earlier they hotly defended. In this lies their
scientific temper, not in the scientific defense of the theory. - Weston La Barre (Ghost Dance, 1972)
Read the The ScienceMadness Guidelines!
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Zyklon-A
International Hazard
Posts: 1547
Registered: 26-11-2013
Member Is Offline
Mood: Fluorine radical
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By the way, I have been reporting all spam I see, but am I on the "list", because they still survive long afterwards?
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froot
Hazard to Others
Posts: 347
Registered: 23-10-2003
Location: South Africa
Member Is Offline
Mood: refluxed
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| Quote: | | If you check the recently registered members list that have a WWW link in their profile |
Can the forum software disallow url's in profiles of members in the 'harmless' group?
We salute the improvement of the human genome by honoring those who remove themselves from it.
Of necessity, this honor is generally bestowed posthumously. - www.darwinawards.com |
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Texium
Administrator
Posts: 4580
Registered: 11-1-2014
Location: Salt Lake City
Member Is Offline
Mood: PhD candidate!
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I agree with froot. People should be able to stand waiting until they've gone past harmless to post their website in their profile.
They could still have it in their signature if they wanted to, whether they're allowed to have it on the profile page or not. It shouldn't actually
hurt real members at all.
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thesmug
Hazard to Others
Posts: 370
Registered: 17-1-2014
Location: Chicago, Il (USA)
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Sorry to go off topic, but have any of you ever tried going to the links in these spam posts? The whole website (which is legitimate) is filled with
0/10 reviews and comments like "this store shouldn't even let you rate above 0/10!" It's actually quite funny.
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Töilet Plünger
Hazard to Self
Posts: 66
Registered: 27-2-2014
Location: /root/
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Why not have a separate group, for those with <10 posts, with a name like "Potential Spambot?" The "Harmless" group is too large to disallow links
for them (case in point: me).
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