Page 14 of 17

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 5:18 pm
by BlueDragmire
Sure hope that downtime this morning was the result of a major drastic fix to get this forum working again.

You know I posted here and not Storyboard for Naked Fiction because they never authenticated my account after weeks after my request. Ironically they’re too secure.

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 5:51 pm
by dublinjohn
BlueDragmire wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2025 5:18 pm Sure hope that downtime this morning was the result of a major drastic fix to get this forum working again.

You know I posted here and not Storyboard for Naked Fiction because they never authenticated my account after weeks after my request. Ironically they’re too secure.
nope another batch of posts

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:17 pm
by Debbifan
For fuck's sake. A curse on all your houses.

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:32 pm
by Girlspns
KiTA wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2025 8:09 am
Enable some form of questions/answer based thing during the sign up process. Add about 5-10 different questions to this and change the pool semi-regularly. Bonus if one of the questions is "not politically correct" which may prevent the AI from being able to answer it. For example, any references to teens and stripping, or questions about common classics of the genre. For example the AI is probably not going to like to give a summary of "Those Pictures" or, depending on which AI provider it is using, the AI might outright refuse to answer due to content.
Sadly, this function exists in the admin forum, but for some godforsaken reason, it just continuously asks the first question all the time, making it absolutely pointless.

As for creating a new subforum for new users, technically we already do this, But I don't think these are just automated spambots just for the reason of volume.

We've had spam bot infestations before, where we get something like 30-40 users a day that keep spamming stuff just like the example you gave, those are actually being stopped as we speak.

But this one is just four or five users a day (provided we don't delete them) that spam 100-200 messages before we get to them, and the e-mails they use seem to have taunting messages, this is apparently a human user creating accounts and handing them off to spambots for malicious purposes, and I say this having set up like three anti-spam measures including Google ReCapcha, Akismet and even open source databases.

If all of these can't stop it, that just tells me this isn't a bot, at least not entirely, based on the evidence.

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:48 pm
by Debbifan
This forum had a problem with a suspiciously similar modus operandi. They appear to have got over it, though that is probably not much help since it is a different format forum. But I don't know if it is worth reaching out to their admin for advice ?

https://enf-cmnf.com/forum/off-topic-di ... sers-bots/

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:56 pm
by computerphoto
Girlspns wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:32 pm
KiTA wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2025 8:09 am
Enable some form of questions/answer based thing during the sign up process. Add about 5-10 different questions to this and change the pool semi-regularly. Bonus if one of the questions is "not politically correct" which may prevent the AI from being able to answer it. For example, any references to teens and stripping, or questions about common classics of the genre. For example the AI is probably not going to like to give a summary of "Those Pictures" or, depending on which AI provider it is using, the AI might outright refuse to answer due to content.
Sadly, this function exists in the admin forum, but for some godforsaken reason, it just continuously asks the first question all the time, making it absolutely pointless.

As for creating a new subforum for new users, technically we already do this, But I don't think these are just automated spambots just for the reason of volume.

We've had spam bot infestations before, where we get something like 30-40 users a day that keep spamming stuff just like the example you gave, those are actually being stopped as we speak.

But this one is just four or five users a day (provided we don't delete them) that spam 100-200 messages before we get to them, and the e-mails they use seem to have taunting messages, this is apparently a human user creating accounts and handing them off to spambots for malicious purposes, and I say this having set up like three anti-spam measures including Google ReCapcha, Akismet and even open source databases.

If all of these can't stop it, that just tells me this isn't a bot, at least not entirely, based on the evidence.
Then why not just delete those users accounts, or ban the IP address they are coming from

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:59 pm
by Girlspns
Oh, I have been doing that, constantly in fact, another element that makes me think this person is doing this by hand, because it'd be easy to just use a VPN to switch to a new IP address.

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 8:41 pm
by Darky
Yeah, we ban every username and including IP adress, but apparently that isn’t enough to stop them.

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 11:17 pm
by Kazu
computerphoto wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:56 pm
Then why not just delete those users accounts, or ban the IP address they are coming from
Unfortunately IP banning hasn't been a viable option for spammers for a long time, since VPNs became a thing(as the admins have said). It it just too easy jump to a number of different ones. Additionally, your IP changes occasionally just due to how the ISP works unless you are still rockin' a dial-up connection.

If there was a mute function, it might serve as a good temp option. Or a way to make it that you have to make a certain amount of posts before a signature is allowed.

Re: Spammers

Posted: Sat Feb 15, 2025 11:47 pm
by computerphoto
Kazu wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2025 11:17 pm
computerphoto wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2025 7:56 pm
Then why not just delete those users accounts, or ban the IP address they are coming from
Unfortunately IP banning hasn't been a viable option for spammers for a long time, since VPNs became a thing(as the admins have said). It it just too easy jump to a number of different ones. Additionally, your IP changes occasionally just due to how the ISP works unless you are still rockin' a dial-up connection.

If there was a mute function, it might serve as a good temp option. Or a way to make it that you have to make a certain amount of posts before a signature is allowed.
Not sure if its an option but if it shows everyone mac address that is a lot harder to fake, yes I know about VPN's I use one myself on my phone.