Sorry for the spam... we're on it.

mark

Dear Community,

Obviously we've had problems with spammers recently, especially this morning with hundreds of spam posts (now deleted.) We apologize for such "noise" in this feed, and we're developing a strategy to prevent it in the future.

Thanks for your patience while we sort this out.

Best Wishes,
Mark

Woland

I couldn't not...

bonemap

@mark said:

problems with spammers

It appears relentless with numerous simultaneous spam posts every few hours - it must be a spambot attack!

mark

Damn! These people are relentless!

We're testing some plugins to solve the problem... sorry again for the noise. :-(

Best,
M

Woland

@mark

Yeah they seem determined. Multiple spambot accounts each posting every few minutes, what a headache!

Also, I was wondering, as it wasn't addressed in your response to the message I sent you @Michel and @Skulpture , is it helpful not helpful for me to:

1) Notify you of spambot accounts when I see them appear?

2) Downvote spambot posts?

3) Flag spambot posts for moderation?

Best wishes,

Woland (Lucas Wilson-Spiro)

Michel

@Woland

Dear Lucas

Well If you down vote spambot posts I do not see them quicker. Same when you flag them for moderation. I look into the forum every day nearly every hour and I guess Graham does so as well. It may help if you notify us. Either way, thanks for your help.

Best Michel

Woland

@Michel

Great! Thanks for the info. I'll not downvote or flag spambot posts from now on. I'm certainly not looking to complicate your job or waste anyone's time, so thanks for letting me know what's helpful and what isn't. I was flagging them because a while ago there was an outbreak of spam posts in what I believe would have been the wee hours of the morning for you and Graham, so I contacted @Dusx and asked him what I should do. He told me to contact either you or Graham and flag the spam posts for moderation, and that he would do the same, which is why I started doing that. Thanks for all of your hard work keeping the forum shipshape :)

Best wishes,

Woland (Lucas Wilson-Spiro)

bonemap

@mark said:

Damn! These people are relentless!

It is a massive SPAM wall with a spike of over 100+ entries - can't be a nice thing to wake up to!

mark

Dear All,

We're actively testing solutions. We just don't want them to break the whole forum, so we need to be methodical about. Thanks again for your patience.

Best Wishes,
Mark

Woland

May as well capitalize on the situation though, right?

CitizenJoe

@Woland Funny.
But the spam thing is awful. I don't envy you...

bonemap

Hi

It is that time of day again. The Asian spam tsunami...

mark

Dear All,

@Michel and our programmer Tobias have installed tools that will hopefully end the daily flood of spam. Thanks for your patience while we implemented this. We wanted to make sure nothing horrible would happen to the forum as a result.

Best Wishes,
Mark

bonemap

@mark said:

installed tools that will hopefully end the daily flood of spam

Hmmm!

mark

@bonemap

Well, we installed ReCaptcha and it seems to have had little effect. @Michel just installed another tool. Let's see if that does anything.

What a pain in the ass!

Thanks everyone for your patience.

Best Wishes,
Mark

Skulpture

That was a crazy few days.... I can tell you all this; I DONT feel like going to a university in China!

mark

Well, first morning in a week or so that I haven't woken up to spam. Maybe we nailed it. Fingers crossed. ;-)

Best Wishes,
Mark

bonemap

@mark said:

we nailed it

Holding my breath

mark

@bonemap

Well, when I wrote that I didn't know that @Michel had switch to manually approving all applicants, which means extra work for us of course. NodeBB has a better solution in their latest version, which still requires manual approval but will make it easier to manage. We'll be upgrading this weekend hopefully. In any case, the Michel's actions have stopped the flood.

Best Wishes,
Mark

bonemap

@mark said:

which still requires manual approval

So no silver lining yet