ATGC Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 Lately, more and more spammers have been signing up and continuing to post the same garbage (Nike shoes and the DVD crap). I know you guys are well aware of this but I am wondering why registration process isn't being beefed up? Just reporting the spam for the mods is beginning to be a slow process now and the spam threads are getting unnecessary views and clicks because of it. :/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kami- Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 :yes: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Panacik Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 Lately, more and more spammers have been signing up and continuing to post the same garbage (Nike shoes and the DVD crap). I know you guys are well aware of this but I am wondering why registration process isn't being beefed up? Just reporting the spam for the mods is beginning to be a slow process now and the spam threads are getting unnecessary views and clicks because of it. :/ I believe they are taking steps to resolve this matter. The main step is that they have stopped free timebombed email accounts from being used for the signup process. Only free accounts such as hotmail or yahoo are allowed. Although it does not take much to create a new account in yahoo etc, it is a lot more time consuming for these people. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shockz Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 What types of suggestions would you like us to implement? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tehsplink Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 How about a text confirmation such as what is 627 plus 3. There are multiple addons for this kind of thing for forums, just check out the googlinator. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATGC Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 What types of suggestions would you like us to implement? Rapidshare type captchas (the kitten ones) or 2x email verification process. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrew Lyle Global Moderator Posted November 7, 2008 Global Moderator Share Posted November 7, 2008 Rapidshare type captchas (the kitten ones) or 2x email verification process. For every fake account, there is probably 1000 real accounts. It would be pointless to make all those 1000 people struggle over a spammer, where he can easily be banned with a few clicks of the mouse. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zhangm Supervisor Posted November 7, 2008 Supervisor Share Posted November 7, 2008 What types of suggestions would you like us to implement? I think simple questions are intuitive enough. Math questions don't pose any sort of cultural barrier. 2 + 2 =6 - 1 = 14 / 2 = 2^7 = sqrt(13) = ln(1) = Derivative of the function f(x) = 14. Number of natural numbers between -5 and 5. Integrate [sin(x)]^2. :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATGC Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 For every fake account, there is probably 1000 real accounts. It would be pointless to make all those 1000 people struggle over a spammer, where he can easily be banned with a few clicks of the mouse. Struggle? I didn't know users registering at Neowin were in pain. It will be a minor update on the registration process already in place. Added benefits include NO MORE SPAM THREADS and less work for the mods. For example, look at the Invision Power forums registration process (link). It has a two-step captcha process: (1) Enter the words seen in the image and (2) copy a line of code into a textbox. Compare that with Neowin's registration process. I'm sure they see less spam... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roadgeek9 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 I think simple questions are intuitive enough. Math questions don't pose any sort of cultural barrier. +1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Audioboxer Subscriber² Posted November 7, 2008 Subscriber² Share Posted November 7, 2008 Is there anyway users with say under 5 posts are void of being able to post urls in their first five posts? Guess that's kind of annoying for legit people though. How about just the first post can't contain a url? Coding that would probably be a pain in the ass though :laugh: I don't mind just reporting spam, but I'm sure some of you guys might come up with some good ideas to help Neowin :yes: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roadgeek9 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 Is there anyway users with say under 5 posts are void of being able to post urls in their first five posts?Guess that's kind of annoying for legit people though. How about just the first post can't contain a url? Coding that would probably be a pain in the ass though :laugh: I don't mind just reporting spam, but I'm sure some of you guys might come up with some good ideas to help Neowin :yes: These new propositions are like airport security. Non-terrorists (98% of the world (if were lucky)) can't stand it, but think of it like this, you would rather be screened, because then you can be assured that if there is a terrorist that wants to board the plane, it's more difficult for them to get on. Same goes for Neowin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Audioboxer Subscriber² Posted November 7, 2008 Subscriber² Share Posted November 7, 2008 These new propositions are like airport security. Non-terrorists (98% of the world (if were lucky)) can't stand it, but think of it like this, you would rather be screened, because then you can be assured that if there is a terrorist that wants to board the plane, it's more difficult for them to get on.Same goes for Neowin. :laugh:, great analogy ;) I hear what you're saying, whenever measures get implemented that require user effort, they have to be the best balance between effective and non-time consuming. Get the balance wrong and you annoy legit users. Get it right, and hopefully spam (or the terrorists ;)) get put off. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATGC Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 These new propositions are like airport security. Non-terrorists (98% of the world (if were lucky)) can't stand it, but think of it like this, you would rather be screened, because then you can be assured that if there is a terrorist that wants to board the plane, it's more difficult for them to get on.Same goes for Neowin. I'm sure people understand the problem without your terrorism analogy. 2% of the world population are terrorists? Please. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roadrunna Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 How about members with less than say 10 posts being unable to make new threads. Ok so they can post spam in existing threads but they can be deleted and banned early without making lots of new useless threads. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred Derf Veteran Posted November 7, 2008 Veteran Share Posted November 7, 2008 I think simple questions are intuitive enough. Math questions don't pose any sort of cultural barrier. Nah, bots aren't emotional so we need to add meaningful questions like "If you were a tree, what sort of tree would you be?" Or just give them the Replicant test from BladeRunner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Audioboxer Subscriber² Posted November 7, 2008 Subscriber² Share Posted November 7, 2008 How about members with less than say 10 posts being unable to make new threads.Ok so they can post spam in existing threads but they can be deleted and banned early without making lots of new useless threads. A lot of people initially sign up to ask a question, I wouldn't think this is a good idea. Many people will tell you the reason they signed up to NW is to ask for help. Not being able to create a topic, means not being able to ask for help (unless they happen to be able to ask in an existing thread). That's why I suggested no urls in 1 post wonders. If a spammer can't link you, it makes them less effective. Although there are as we know easy workarounds around blockage of active links... so it falls flat in some ways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred Derf Veteran Posted November 7, 2008 Veteran Share Posted November 7, 2008 Incidentally, the serious answer is that we will likely wait for IPB to implement security/registration improvements. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATGC Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 Incidentally, the serious answer is that we will likely wait for IPB to implement security/registration improvements. Why not use the same registration process already seen on IPB forums? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roadgeek9 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 2% of the world population are terrorists? Please. I know, that's pretty well exaggerated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred Derf Veteran Posted November 7, 2008 Veteran Share Posted November 7, 2008 Why not use the same registration process already seen on IPB forums? I would have assumed that we do but it has been a while since I signed up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wst50 Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 As it's vaguely relevant, could there be some method of preventing people replying with 3 words or less, in posts. It would stop a lot of 'actual human being' spam. If all someone has to add to the topic is ':lol:' or 'QFT', or 'LMAO', then they needn't have added anything at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATGC Posted November 7, 2008 Author Share Posted November 7, 2008 I would have assumed that we do but it has been a while since I signed up. Its a bit different now. :p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZonoBurk Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 (edited) Well I'm definitely not fond of completely restricting a new users' posting privilege. It's been a long time since I registered also, so I don't know what you have to do now. However, It would seem as a few repeated characters isn't 'getting it' anymore. It may need to be LITTLE more complex now. Edited November 7, 2008 by Myke Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EcPercy Posted November 7, 2008 Share Posted November 7, 2008 I had a mod I put on one of my phpBB installs that would do this: You would hide one of the options on the account registration. (e.g website) A normal person would not see this field when they register and so they would not try to fill it in, but a script would fill out all "fields" hidden or not and when a spammer filled out this invisible field their account was blocked from being able to post. Here is a list I have of known spamming domains too. It may help you a lot to just block all of these. (See attachment) bots_email.txt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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