Chances of blocking legit members?

Wicked · 2010-01-25 12:16 am

I tried installing the VB Mod by pedigree to block registrations of spammers. For whatever reasons I had a failed use of the mod and had some buggy results. Perhaps my server set up I dont know.

Either way as an alternate solution I have planned on downloading the list of ips in the database and place them all to be blocked on my forum. What are my chances of blocking legitimate members from signing up by taking this approach. I have a new slow growing forum. I am getting about 1 new member every 3 days. 8 out of 10 are registered spammers here in this database. This is only the beginning and is already overwhelming stats and effort.

pedigree · 2010-01-25 4:10 am

I would be interested in finding out about the buggy responses in the script and fixing them, if you can give more details.

And as catching innocent people, it could happen. Some spammers have used common names and some people will have an IP number that a spammer has used, either via trojan/bot/zombie, a proxy server or having just spammed and moved along.

Mackormoses · 2010-01-28 2:20 am

Personally, I'm not a big fan of pre-banning or rejecting registration. By the sounds of it, the space between registrations for your forum is more than manageable. As such, just manually check them out - if they match an ip on here, then use the other data provided (location, username, etc) to try and see if they are a likely spammer.

MartinV · 2010-01-28 4:15 am

You can easily show a blocked person a webpage that holds information how to contact you in case of trouble. Give them an email address (gmail has lots of them ) and ask them to send you some verifiable information that shows they are legitimate and interested in your forum.

I use this, and created a separate gmail address for that. Any mail that arrives there (one in the last six months) is forwarded to my normal mail account so I know there is a message. This way possible spammers do not get a useful email address and at the same time legitimate people can contact you. In addition to the verifiable information, the email headers may contain the originating IP of the email, giving you some additional info.

EOC_Jason · 2010-01-28 3:59 pm

I would not just blindly block all IPs... Because most people have a dynamic IP the AGE of the "last seen" match is particularly important...

If you haven't seen spam from an IP in say 30 days... They probably have a different IP... Thus the next person that comes along and gets assigned that IP (randomly from their ISP) probably isn't a spammer.

Given enough time, I suppose in theory every dynamic IP on the planet could end up in a list...

rhyfedd · 2010-01-28 7:42 pm

I agree. That's particularly true with AOL.

RFiend · 2010-02-03 10:10 pm

We just added the mod to one of our SMF forums to check new registrations against the database, and I've set it to ONLY check the e-mail and IP address to reduce the chance of a Real Person getting caught up. The username isn't very valuable as a filter, especially if a spammer uses 'Joe' or something common as a user. The highest reliability test is the IP address, since their spam tool can generate pseudo-random Google email addresses, changing every day.

Proxies WILL fall foul of the database check if they've been used for spam, so you'll have to make a command decision on whether to allow them. There's arguments here both ways on that subject. I only block proxies on REALLY abusive hosts where it doesn't have a discrete IP address.

You can do a quick Google on an IP address and get a reasonable guess on whether it's a proxy with this:
www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=proxy%3A+%22IPADDRESS%22
replacing the IPADDRESS part with your dotted IP address. That's what I use for a sanity check if I get an IP address hit.

creativepart · 2010-03-08 10:19 am

We check all three, username, email and IP. We do get a lot of hits on usrename.

I've had 3 or 4 complaints from folks about getting called a spammer, but in every case they used some very stupid username choice like: Bob or Jim. One guy kept getting rejected and he contacted me. The username he was trying to register was "unregistered".

Anyway, I just tell them we have a system to block spammers and they've chosen a far too simple username and one that has been in use by spammers.

We have 200 new members a day, so, if I lose a couple of legit members then so be it. This service keeps out thousands of bots.

pedigree · 2010-03-08 11:25 am

You can edit the message that they get. Perhaps change it to "The username, email or IP address you are using to register has tripped the spammer detection system used on this forum. Please consider using another username, one that isnt so generic" so something like that.

There is no keeping 100% of the people happy, 100% of the time

#1 2010-01-25 12:16 am

Chances of blocking legit members?

#2 2010-01-25 4:10 am

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

#3 2010-01-28 2:20 am

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

#4 2010-01-28 4:15 am

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

#5 2010-01-28 3:59 pm

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

#6 2010-01-28 7:42 pm

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

#7 2010-02-03 10:10 pm

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

#8 2010-03-08 10:19 am

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

#9 2010-03-08 11:25 am

Re: Chances of blocking legit members?

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