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- Rumanti
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
… do anything for money… You mean? So a spambot puts viruses on your computer?! People these days…
:wq
- ProdigyZeta7
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
It's one of those English phrases. It indicates one's disbelief of what people do. It's really quite stupid how people are willing to do anything to ruin the lives of others, such as creating malicious spambots.… do anything for money… You mean? So a spambot puts viruses on your computer?! People these days…
Now spambots themselves don't carry viruses. It's their job to give you a link to a webpage with dangerous code: the kind that causes an automated download of content without warning the user. This content almost always contains some kind of malware or virus that is never detected at first.
Last edited by ProdigyZeta7 (Dec. 1, 2013 07:36:24)
- Rumanti
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
Okay thanksIt's one of those English phrases. It indicates one's disbelief of what people do. It's really quite stupid how people are willing to do anything to ruin the lives of others, such as creating malicious spambots.… do anything for money… You mean? So a spambot puts viruses on your computer?! People these days…
Now spambots themselves don't carry viruses. It's their job to give you a link to a webpage with dangerous code: the kind that causes an automated download of content without warning the user. This content almost always contains some kind of malware or virus that is never detected at first.
:wq
- scimonster
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
It sounded like first a human spammer registers and posts, then the spambot copies what the human did. So a spambot puts viruses on your computer?! People these days…
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- Harakou
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
On filtering links out completely, it probably would help, though in my experience, for every filter mechanism you add, spammers find a way around it. It would certainly make it tougher for people to follow their links, but it would also make things more difficult for new users without doing much to reduce spam.
And we are looking at implementing honeypots, so good idea there.
When it comes to reporting spam, try to avoid replying to the topics. Chastising spammers or saying “spam” isn't going to make them stop, and just bumps their topic back to the top of the list. Most people here seem pretty good about not doing that, but it pops up occasionally, so I thought I'd mention it.
And we are looking at implementing honeypots, so good idea there.
When it comes to reporting spam, try to avoid replying to the topics. Chastising spammers or saying “spam” isn't going to make them stop, and just bumps their topic back to the top of the list. Most people here seem pretty good about not doing that, but it pops up occasionally, so I thought I'd mention it.
- ScratchJahd2011
- Scratcher
500+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
When it comes to reporting spam, try to avoid replying to the topics. Chastising spammers or saying “spam” isn't going to make them stop, and just bumps their topic back to the top of the list. Most people here seem pretty good about not doing that, but it pops up occasionally, so I thought I'd mention it.
That would be my fault, unfortunately.
…..
- Sonickyle
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
I think's we're talking about the “Watch movies online!” spam posts. I think I've already reported 3 “hey bro whats up” topics…
Yes, something has to be done.
I've been reporting them as soon as I see them.
No I don't make projects anymore. I left some time ago.
I only check the forums every now and then, but other than that consider me retired.
I only check the forums every now and then, but other than that consider me retired.
- jvvg
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
Maybe we could give this CAPTCHA a shot?Unfortunately, most spambots have adapted to that. I tried it on a forum I own, but it stopped working after a few weeks. That's why I now use stopforumspam.com and a much more advanced CAPTCHA.
So the idea is you have markup something like this:and a style like this:<form> <input type="text" name="TheRealUsername" placeholder="Username" /> <input type="text" name="username" placeholder="Please leave this field blank" class="hide" /> </form>and then simply block anybody who tries to enter anything in the field with the name=“username”. This works because spambots just read the flat html and don't evaluate the style. It would be trivial to write your own bot to get around this, but only script kiddies or people who suck at SEO use bots and they don't know how to write their own. {{citation needed}}.hide { display: none !important; }
—–
Now here's the above part, just rewritten so it's easier to understand :P
So you make the signup form look like this:, and then you take the box that says “Leave blank” and hide it way off screen. However, spambots are stupid and they will still enter their username into the “Leave blank” field! This is because spambots are “blind” - they can only tell the fields apart by their name. Then it's easy to see of someone's a spammer - just check to see of anything's in the “leave blank” field.┌──────────┐
Username: │ │ <- name="RealUsername"
└──────────┘
┌──────────┐
Leave blank: │ │ <- name="username"
└──────────┘
┌──────────┐
Password: │ │ <- name="password"
└──────────┘
—–
Obviously this method won't block human spammers. There's nothing better than a good old fashioned report button, however. Press it whenever you're even only suspicious of spam activity.
Professional web developer and lead engineer on the Scratch Wiki
Maybe the Scratch Team isn't so bad — Why the April Fools' Day forum didn't work last year
- jontmy00
- Scratcher
500+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
I hate stopforumspam.com.
I haven't really encountered many, and the current spammers aren't as spammy as the 1.4 ones; the most I've found is 1-2 topics by the same user.
I haven't really encountered many, and the current spammers aren't as spammy as the 1.4 ones; the most I've found is 1-2 topics by the same user.
- Harakou
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
That's because we remove the threads and ban them very quickly, thanks to our dedicated users that report them. You might not notice many, especially if you don't often browse the forum sections which they favor. It's a daily occurrence. I haven't really encountered many, and the current spammers aren't as spammy as the 1.4 ones; the most I've found is 1-2 topics by the same user.
- PullJosh
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
My idea: The ST should design a custom captcha where there are three parts of the scratch cat that you have to drag around and place in the correct positions to complete the image. It would be easy for humans, hard for bots, and it would still be scratch-styled!
- Deerleg
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
However, what if a trustworthy person couldn't figure it out? My idea: The ST should design a custom captcha where there are three parts of the scratch cat that you have to drag around and place in the correct positions to complete the image. It would be easy for humans, hard for bots, and it would still be scratch-styled!
- SuperNicky
- Scratcher
100+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
:l not really sure about that one the spambot could put in I can testify that it's actually likely to take up to a couple hours to deal with spammas. (My latest report was “Spamma.” )
I think a simple captcha would be better than none; even just something like this one.\
First name: sfhjseksjhgsiejreuk
Last name: ejkjkserhlsajifseofijsd
- AonymousGuy
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
:l not really sure about that one the spambot could put in I can testify that it's actually likely to take up to a couple hours to deal with spammas. (My latest report was “Spamma.” )
I think a simple captcha would be better than none; even just something like this one.\
First name: sfhjseksjhgsiejreuk
Last name: ejkjkserhlsajifseofijsd
But the point is the bot would have to slide it, which it might not be able to do.
- ProdigyZeta7
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
I think I have the solution.
I've researched OCR (Optical Character Recognition) which is what spambots use to “read” CAPTCHAs. The problem is that every CAPTCHA is composed of letters. What there needs to be is a CAPTCHA image of a simple object, such as a car, apple, dog, etc. Bots can read words, but can they read pictures? Checkmate.
I think we are about to revolutionize the fight against spam.
I've researched OCR (Optical Character Recognition) which is what spambots use to “read” CAPTCHAs. The problem is that every CAPTCHA is composed of letters. What there needs to be is a CAPTCHA image of a simple object, such as a car, apple, dog, etc. Bots can read words, but can they read pictures? Checkmate.
I think we are about to revolutionize the fight against spam.
- scratchisthebest
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
Winner! I think we are about to revolutionize the fight against spam.
Now the downside to this is that a dictionary attack can be used if we don't have enough pictures
Also, the language barrier.
I am a Lava Expert
- scratchisthebest
- Scratcher
1000+ posts
Spambot activity - How you can stop it
Still, that's 100+ little strings that need to be translated into 50+ languages before we can roll this out.Right. Also, the language barrier.So just have a translator ready.
I like the idea (a lot) but it might take a while to get started.
I am a Lava Expert