Lots of spam posts

michelkeijzers · Post by **michelkeijzers** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 9:19 am

This message is meant for Sharp mainly:

Lately I see a lot of posts with some random fragment of a story including links to spam probably.

I noticed all the users have a name of the form of some characters followed with digits.

Is there a possibility to get rid (automatically or semi-automatically) of these users?

Post by **mikemolloyuk** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 11:04 am

Hi michelkeijzers

We (the moderators) have been doing what we can to curb this problem.

We move the posts to a moderator only section of the site so it doesn't impact to much on what you guys want to read/talk about . In that area Sharp can establish if there is a pattern to where the spam is comming from. He seems to be narrowing it down to particular parts of the world so hopefully soon he will be able to block the spammers for now.

We appreciate your patience.

cello · Post by **cello** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 11:41 am

Have to say that Sharp is doing an amazing job in this regard.

I set up a forum (phpBB) a couple of months ago and ultimately had to close it down as I was getting around 100 spambots hitting the ite every day. I then changed the membership options to admin approval, but then got about 150 applications for membership every day! Yes, EVERY DAY.

So to see only the occasional spam post per week shows how well Sharp and the mods are minimising and controlling the inconvenience of these damn things.

michelkeijzers · Post by **michelkeijzers** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 11:51 am

Ok sorry I didn't know about it.

In that case the moderators are doing an exceptional job. Until a few weeks ago I almost never saw spam.

I really don't mind much about it because I recognize it easily, but if it can be removed easily by moderators, it would help the readability.

I am glad they want to keep this site clean because it's the major Korg users communication site.

Dogmatic1010 · Post by **Dogmatic1010** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 5:35 pm

In the case of spambots and spam posts, should we also be aware of those who post items in the Buy and Sell section that look too good to be true? I mean I saw on a post (now deleted) not too long ago from someone with a long list of keyboards selling for even under warehouse prices! I put a reply on that post saying along the lines of "How much of this is a scam?" I never got a reply plus the next day the topic was gone. So I think I stopped the scammer in its tracks. I mean he shouldve listed a official website or something to verify that it wasnt a scam.

Especially if the "seller" is overseas. So I suggest we, both mods and members, look out for these types of topics and if necessary just question them or delete them.

Derek

michelkeijzers · Post by **michelkeijzers** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 5:45 pm

Yes that one was really fake, someone from England; I had contact but he stopped chatting when I asked to pick it up myself (or let someone pick it up).

Dogmatic1010 · Post by **Dogmatic1010** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 5:53 pm

Did he ask about doing payment by WesternUnion or MoneyGram? If he/she definately doesnt offer a paypal or other more secure way of paying, it screams out a scam. So never EVER do Westernunion or Moneygram. And seeing what you described, he wasnt a persistent scammer.

michelkeijzers · Post by **michelkeijzers** » Wed Nov 23, 2011 5:54 pm

I can't remember anymore ... but he insisted on doing a payment very quickly.

Post by **mikemolloyuk** » Thu Nov 24, 2011 8:48 am

Hi Guys

As a moderator I (as do other moderators) try to monitor each forum when possible and remove anything that looks suspicious.

If however you see a post that looks to be possibly not spam but a scam, please feel free to PM me and I will check it out. Just copy the URL directly from the page you are looking at in the message to me.

Thanks

michelkeijzers · Post by **michelkeijzers** » Thu Nov 24, 2011 9:26 am

Thanks, I guess everybody is willingly to help clean spam/rubbish posts asap.

Jon Lord · Post by **Jon Lord** » Thu Nov 24, 2011 10:33 am

The mods are doing a great job with the spam, saw few messages few days ago but thats not very often that happens over here.
I've had major problems myself with SPAM on a phpbb3 forum that I ran and I had to shut down the registration system completely. Tried changing Captcha systems but It seems most of them are broken by the bots.

Aciphecs · Post by **Aciphecs** » Thu Nov 24, 2011 6:01 pm

I agree that they do a great job at keeping our community clean. I just wish we had a "Report this post" button. I've used it on other forums and it's a nice feature.

Dogmatic1010 · Post by **Dogmatic1010** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 2:50 am

It would be a great feature to adopt for this forum. But it could also be abused.

Aciphecs · Post by **Aciphecs** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 3:24 am

In other forums you have to put a reason for reporting. If the mods see someone report a post because of a reason other than SPAM, scam or any other offense of forum policy, they would simply ignore/delete the report and do nothing.

michelkeijzers · Post by **michelkeijzers** » Fri Nov 25, 2011 8:57 am

Aciphecs wrote:In other forums you have to put a reason for reporting. If the mods see someone report a post because of a reason other than SPAM, scam or any other offense of forum policy, they would simply ignore/delete the report and do nothing.

Looks like a valuable addition to be added ... and will help the moderator(s) in the long term too.