Warning!

[Canoe Sailing Magazine]

As all of you who sign up for sites and forums know, most require a user to sign up and get approved, most often via a return email to which they must respond. I do this in CSM.

Today, it failed.

A 'person' who signed up turned out to [seemingly] be a robot. I checked the location [i require City, state, country] and it was [seemingly] bogus. here's the info in the order I just mentioned. I ADVISE YOU DO NOT CLICK OR ACCESS THESE IN ANY WAY!

User Name: CheappOemSoftwware

Email: oem2 @ accommodationmalta.info

City: DOWNLOAD AutoCAD OEM SOFTWARE FREE AutoCAD 2008 download for free

State: DOWNLOAD AutoCAD OEM SOFTWARE FREE AutoCAD 2008 dwg downloads

Country: DOWNLOAD AutoCAD OEM SOFTWARE FREE AutoCAD 2008 trial download

I intend on sharing this with other forums and webmasters. Please consider doing the same!

The bastards are going to defeat us if we let our guard down! 

[Craig]

Thanks for the heads up, I just locked him out of BYYB.  8) 8)

[Ken_Potts]

  Thanks for the warning - You might want to disable the hyperlink in the message though, so nobody accidently clicks it (if that's possible)...

[Frank Hagan]

I took care of the hyperlink. 

A key is to have something unusual at the sign up process; I add an additional field with a requirement that is unique to that particular site, and that usually stops the robots.  But the human spammers can still get through, so manually approving all users is the only way to combat this; you end up doing a lot of work with that, but having an automatic registration process almost invites abuses. 

I think you're still ahead of the game now at the BYYB aren't you, Craig?  I think we reduced the spam sign ups and hacking attempts by quite a bit.

[Canoe Sailing Magazine]

Sorry, didn't know how to break the link!

So far, having to respond to the return email has worked. Once we migrate to a new template and bring on a better forum program I'm sure we'll have those hi-speed tools. I do keep my eye on who [what?] signs up, and this one caught my eye. <Whew>

[Frank Hagan]

Having to respond to an email ... "confirm" is what the programs usually call it ... serves two purposes: it makes certain the person has a valid email address and it helps to prevent automated registrations.  But, I found with some forum software a sign-up still puts their profile information in a searchable format on the site.  That's often what the spammers want to increase their "incoming links" for the search engines.  Your software doesn't do that, and the package I've installed here doesn't either (and to be fair, most of the others have probably stopped doing it).

I still get plenty of spam registrations at my links directory.  When I re-do messing-about, I'll probably lose that feature entirely.

[Craig]

Yes Frank we are looking pretty good.  I trace every IP.  If the IP, email, and user name don't look right or is something I know is trouble I dump the app.  If they look OK but don't follow the user name convention I approve them for 48 hours and send an e-mail asking that they change the user name.  If the do fine, if not they are gone.  Transfering our ban list from the old board really helps.  So far so good.  8)

[Oyster]

Yes Frank we are looking pretty good.  I trace every IP.  If the IP, email, and user name don't look right or is something I know is trouble I dump the app.  If they look OK but don't follow the user name convention I approve them for 48 hours and send an e-mail asking that they change the user name.  If the do fine, if not they are gone.  Transfering our ban list from the old board really helps.  So far so good.   8)

Ah the problem with some of us scallywags is that we only answer to certain paging labels and its kinda hard to change after so many years. ;D This old dog you know.... Some things are just hard to break. So how is your forum going now with boat building and members?

[Craig]

Very well Mike.  We have; with Franks help, OK Frank has, stopped our spam issues and cut the workload by  ~80%.  We have quite a number of new people joining the board.  Building is slow being winter but some folks; like others we know, keep plugging along dispite the Wx.  Paul and I are still working the design of the Saralee II but so far that large project is still in the planning/design stage.  We have opened the group to all designs now and are looking forward to things picking up as spring nears.  We are all enjoying your new build.  Keep them photos coming  8) 8) 8)

[adla]

someone needs to renew the domain name 

[PAR]

Speaking of which Craig, I pick up more ink and will get paper Monday morning. Your "tube" should arrive during the week . . .

Why can't someone develop a particularly devious bit of software that will corrupt a persons hard drive and load it into a "bot" to search and destroy these bastards that play these games.

[Frank Hagan]

someone needs to renew the domain name 

Actually, its a bit more complicated ... I had registered byyb.info to set up and test the new format a year ago, but had the data center change the account to byyb.org.  Now, for some reason, the http://byyb.org/forum/ is pointing to the old byyb.info domain name (and that is going to a domain holding page).  We'll get it fixed shortly.

Update:  its fixed now.  The forum software had some old links hidden in the config files; I found them by exporting the database and then manually editing the entries.  The main forums are back (and now I have the same to do for the archived forums).

[Craig]

Thanks Frank!  We'd be lost without you!!!!!!  8) 8) 8)

[Frank Hagan]

Thanks Frank!  We'd be lost without you!!!!!!  8) 8) 8)

Well, I created this problem, so its only fair that I fix it!  (It was the "test site" we set up that threw the monkey wrench into the mix, but that did make the transition much easier than going "cold turkey").