Spam Problem

[chrrox]

Is it possible to ad a captcha to the registration process to try to stop the spam bots registering.

[Mr.Mouse]

Well, it is on. We will update the site with something else soon. The captcha never worked, I had my own measure in place before we were attacked. Let me see if I can get my own protection in place again.

[Dinoguy1000]

A phpBB 3 forum I administrate uses ReCAPTCHA; it does a great job of keeping the spambots out while letting humans in (and has the added bonus of helping to digitize old texts).

[Mr.Mouse]

Okay, stuff in place again. Took me 5 minutes. Now why did I not do that sooner.

Anyway, just keep alerting us if you see a spammer, but my measure should keep 99% out now.

[chrrox]

Great Job if only the thanks button was there for me to thank you

[shekofte]

is it bad we have a subforum with the name "introduction" , "lounge" ... or another appropriate name , so that new members only after gaining 10 post counts become qualified to post in other sections ?

also i believe it has some advantages , for example they can discuss about their skills , experiments ... or become familiar with similar members .

for example here is a gfx forum that after months i can't complete that 10 post counts and i am still in the trap
http://forums.ancientclan.com/index.php

[Mr.Mouse]

That idea did cross my mind, however, as you said, someone can be in the trap for some time, because nonsense posts will be deleted. If will encourage people to post about anything just to get to the 10 posts. Basically, that would lead to more moderating necessary.

Still, I will need to look into other options to keep this forum going. As it is, we've needed to increase our hosting packagea couple of months back, because of the growing traffic, and the way we grow now, we will need to further increase soon the next months. I'm thinking to put up "Donate" signs at visible spots at the forum, so people are reminded that they can donate to keep the site going.
An other alternative is to implement the obligation to donate a small amount before a new account is activated. That would probably serve two goals: one: get funding to keep up the free hosting for projects here and two: discourage people who are only going to download stuff to join.

[brienj]

That idea did cross my mind, however, as you said, someone can be in the trap for some time, because nonsense posts will be deleted. If will encourage people to post about anything just to get to the 10 posts. Basically, that would lead to more moderating necessary.

Still, I will need to look into other options to keep this forum going. As it is, we've needed to increase our hosting packagea couple of months back, because of the growing traffic, and the way we grow now, we will need to further increase soon the next months. I'm thinking to put up "Donate" signs at visible spots at the forum, so people are reminded that they can donate to keep the site going.
An other alternative is to implement the obligation to donate a small amount before a new account is activated. That would probably serve two goals: one: get funding to keep up the free hosting for projects here and two: discourage people who are only going to download stuff to join.

Although there really isn't much in the way to download on my site, from the actual forum, everyone always posts links to external sites, I still recently added that only normal users, meaning you have to have a minimum amount of posts, can actually download anything, and newly registered members and guests, could not download any attachment on the forums.

I have got two spam bots on my forums, just in the last 24 hours, and changed to Re-Captcha, from the simple image verification, hoping it will stop, but I'd like to know what it was you implemented here, so I can see about adding it on my forums too.

[Dinoguy1000]

ReCAPTCHA is what I use on another forum myself (did I already say that? ), and since it was installed almost a year ago, we've had pretty much no spam whatsoever.

[Mr.Mouse]

It is very simple. We ask people for a reason to join in an extra registration field. The account is inactive until we review the reason to join. If not satisfied, we do not activate. If empty, we don't even see the new account as it is not registered.

[brienj]

It is very simple. We ask people for a reason to join in an extra registration field. The account is inactive until we review the reason to join. If not satisfied, we do not activate. If empty, we don't even see the new account as it is not registered.

Ah ok, well I switched to ReCaptcha, I guess it may be better than the simple image one, but I personally hate using ReCaptcha whenever I register somewhere, but if I made it so I actually had to approve every person that registered, that would suck, I get enough email crap as it is.

[Mr.Mouse]

Damn, recaptcha don't work, custom theme. Turned on the other one again, and immediately a spammer joined that I had to delete. $@#$@!%#$@!

[Dinoguy1000]

Hmm... Error message, or just not appearing (or breaking horribly)?

not that I can help much, though, just my horridly overactive curiosity

[Mr.Mouse]

Not showing. Will need to look into that. I've noticed that phpbb sometimes does not send admins the emails to approve new applications. That sucks. So for now, I leave it at this and please get rid of spammers if you see em. Just delete their posts and ban their asses.
I will look into the recaptcha issue soon.

[shekofte]

nice going Dr mike
i sincerely wish xentax become an unbelievable environment