APIs

You are welcome to experiment with and incorporate this API in your application. Someday I hope to write some plugins for software packages like phpBB to make it any easier.

For premade scripts that probably integrate into your forum software, visit the downloads page.

How to Use

It's just an HTTP GET, and the page will return some simple XML indicating the type of search performed, whether it appears or not in our database, and the number of times it appears (frequency).

API queries against my server are currently limited to 5000 per day. If you require more, consider using the DNSBL below.

A typical successful response would look like this:

<response success="true">
     <type>ip</type>
     <appears>yes</appears>
     <lastseen>2007-09-18 05:48:53</lastseen>
     <frequency>2</frequency>
</response>

Here are some examples:

• http://www.stopforumspam.com/api?ip=91.186.18.61
• http://www.stopforumspam.com/api?email=g2fsehis5e@mail.ru
• http://www.stopforumspam.com/api?username=MariFoogwoogy

Based on a return of "yes", you can choose to deny registration. The lookup is case insensitive, too. Note that you will get an error message if your IP address or email address is improperly formatted.

DNSBL Queries

Our data is now shared with dnsbl.tornevall.org, please consider incorporating DNS checks first to reduce load on our server. Check their usage page for instructions.

Adding to the Database

Submissions to the database first require an API key. You can then use our add form to submit your spammer data. Please note that if you sign up on our forums with the same email address you used when you registered your API key, your key will be pre-populated in the form as long as you're logged in.

You can automate submissions by making an HTTP POST to the following URL, with the following parameters:

http://www.stopforumspam.com/add.php
?username=USERNAME
&ip_addr=IPADDRESS
&email=EMAILADDRESS
&api_key=ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

To verify, check the HTTP status code returned. a 200 will indicate a successful submission, whereas a 403 will indicate an unsuccessful attempt. A reason will be given (inside a paragraph tag) for unsuccessful attempts. Nothing will be returned for a successful submission.

Note that all information is required to submit (username, email, and IP address).

Terms

• Your use of this data and supporting software is non-commercial
• You will not charge money for any software that utilizes the data
• API queries are limited to 5000 per day
• Anything else is covered under a Creative Commons License