Constant Spam Threads

[asid61]

Originally Posted by Connor McBride

Is there anyway someone can track the IP adress of where these posts are coming from? Just an idea. Don't know if it can happen.

While I was visiting family in India, I had to access CD through a VPN until I got back (I didn't want to wait for Brandon to let my IP through). I assume any spammers are doing the same.

[ASD20]

Another possible way to at least hide the spam is if a post is reported by say 3 people (pick any number you like), it is then automatically hidden until a mod does something with it. You could also make it only for threads started by accounts less than x days old, with less than x posts, etc. to limit abuse towards legitimate members. This system would enable the threads to be at least temporarily dealt with in a matter of seconds to minutes instead of hours and removes the time sensitivity for mods and I feel like Chief Delphi is capable of not completely abusing a system like this (famous last words).

[MikLast]

Originally Posted by ASD20

Another possible way to at least hide the spam is if a post is reported by say 3 people (pick any number you like), it is then automatically hidden until a mod does something with it.

Can Vbulletin even do this?

[artdutra04]

Note: I deleted the original spam post that started this thread, and moved all of the subsequent discussion to a separate thread.

[Joey1939]

I have seen several different ideas about how to combat spam, but as far as I can tell, nothing has been implemented. I'm not even sure that there is someone maintaining the actual website (as opposed to content). I remember seeing a post awhile back about all the changes that were going to be made to the website, but I can't tell if any of those were actually implemented. Does anyone know who owns and maintains CD?

[tjf]

Originally Posted by Joey1939

I have seen several different ideas about how to combat spam, but as far as I can tell, nothing has been implemented. I'm not even sure that there is someone maintaining the actual website (as opposed to content). I remember seeing a post awhile back about all the changes that were going to be made to the website, but I can't tell if any of those were actually implemented. Does anyone know who owns and maintains CD?

Chief Delphi is maintained by Brandon Martus and a handful of volunteer moderators. It runs an older version of vBulletin, and was intended to move to something newer called "Flarum" [1] once it exited a beta. However, we don't have a timeline for that. Recently though, CD *did* gain HTTPS as a security precaution.

In the meantime, perhaps making users have a valid team number and name to register would be a good idea (ie they enter their team name and number and if they match like on TBA it'll let them in?)

[1] - http://flarum.org/

[asid61]

Originally Posted by tjf

Chief Delphi is maintained by Brandon Martus and a handful of volunteer moderators. It runs an older version of vBulletin, and was intended to move to something newer called "Flarum" [1] once it exited a beta. However, we don't have a timeline for that. Recently though, CD *did* gain HTTPS as a security precaution.

In the meantime, perhaps making users have a valid team number and name to register would be a good idea (ie they enter their team name and number and if they match like on TBA it'll let them in?)

[1] - http://flarum.org/

then what's to stop all of them from just putting in actual numbers of FRC teams? What about students on pre-rookie teams, or people not currently on a team?

[frcguy]

Originally Posted by ASD20

Another possible way to at least hide the spam is if a post is reported by say 3 people (pick any number you like), it is then automatically hidden until a mod does something with it. You could also make it only for threads started by accounts less than x days old, with less than x posts, etc. to limit abuse towards legitimate members. This system would enable the threads to be at least temporarily dealt with in a matter of seconds to minutes instead of hours and removes the time sensitivity for mods and I feel like Chief Delphi is capable of not completely abusing a system like this (famous last words).

Not a bad idea, except I think it would need to be limited to users with a post count over a certain number - 100 maybe? Otherwise I can see threads disappearing left and right as a new form of "trolling".

[tjf]

Originally Posted by frcguy

Not a bad idea, except I think it would need to be limited to users with a post count over a certain number - 100 maybe? Otherwise I can see threads disappearing left and right as a new form of "trolling".

In addition, is there a restriction on new accounts reporting threads? Because, in theory, they could then counter-spam by removing the legitimate content.

[ASD20]

Originally Posted by frcguy

Not a bad idea, except I think it would need to be limited to users with a post count over a certain number - 100 maybe? Otherwise I can see threads disappearing left and right as a new form of "trolling".

There definitely is a potential for abuse, but I don't think it would really actually happen. Most (not all) controversial posts are not the start of a thread, so I think the only case where we would see abuse is blind trolling, not in response to controversy. I really don't think there are many people on CD who engage in that type of trolling, but I am not a mod, so I don't know. However, there are plenty of ways to reduce the chances of abuse even further. I already mentioned some, and you mentioned one as well (though I would just use the same criteria for being able to give real reputation), and there are plenty of other safeguards that could be added. All of these spam accounts (and also real-person trolls) follow very specific patterns, so it is possible to have very specific criteria for what is considered potential spam.

[ratdude747]

Originally Posted by tjf

In the meantime, perhaps making users have a valid team number and name to register would be a good idea (ie they enter their team name and number and if they match like on TBA it'll let them in?)

[1] - http://flarum.org/

What about people like me (and many others, Ether and Looking Forward) who aren't affiliated with a team? Sure, we could be grandfathered, but what about future legitimate non-affiliated people?

That said, while I don't have a specific fix I do know somebody who might. I'm also an active member of Badcaps.net forums and we used to have awful spam issues but the admin (who I know personally) made some changes and now we legitimately have no spam. They do run Vbulletin, and a somewhat old one at that. I know recaptcha was involved at some point but otherwise I have no idea (as I'm no longer a Mod over there).

If it would help I could see what he did and let the Brandon know as potential fixes. (iread: Brandon or a mod PM me for details).

[tjf]

Originally Posted by ratdude747

What about people like me (and many others, Ether and Looking Forward) who aren't affiliated with a team? Sure, we could be grandfathered, but what about future legitimate non-affiliated people?

That said, while I don't have a specific fix I do know somebody who might. I'm also an active member of Badcaps.net forums and we used to have awful spam issues but the admin (who I know personally) made some changes and now we legitimately have no spam. They do run Vbulletin, and a somewhat old one at that. I know recaptcha was involved at some point but otherwise I have no idea (as I'm no longer a Mod over there).

If it would help I could see what he did and let the Brandon know as potential fixes. (iread: Brandon or a mod PM me for details).

That's definitely a concern. The way I'd go about it would be to only force that upon registration, and allow it to be changed as always after registration. However, the reCAPCHA would definitely work better.

[adammiller3122]

Originally Posted by ratdude747

What about people like me (and many others, Ether and Looking Forward) who aren't affiliated with a team? Sure, we could be grandfathered, but what about future legitimate non-affiliated people?

That said, while I don't have a specific fix I do know somebody who might. I'm also an active member of Badcaps.net forums and we used to have awful spam issues but the admin (who I know personally) made some changes and now we legitimately have no spam. They do run Vbulletin, and a somewhat old one at that. I know recaptcha was involved at some point but otherwise I have no idea (as I'm no longer a Mod over there).

If it would help I could see what he did and let the Brandon know as potential fixes. (iread: Brandon or a mod PM me for details).

I also have experience Moding/Admining forums, so if my help is needed, I would be more than happy to help.

[ctt956]

I'm not sure requiring team numbers and even names would work. While it may be effective for a while, the spammers will eventually outsmart it. It would be worse to see spam posted by a "team". If they can put a location in, they could put in a team name and number.

[Chris is me]

One possible solution would be to prevent users with less than some small number of posts (5? 10?) from editing posts. These threads are made by users posting a thread with some nonsense text but no link, then going back and editing the thread to include the link.

A lot of the problem with "require information at registration" thing is that sometimes, actual humans are the ones mass creating spam accounts, and they can do some quick reading to figure out what information they can put in to pass initial scrutiny.

I do not think anything good can come from having threads automatically removed after a certain number of reports or anything like that. Spam threads are annoying but not such a big deal that we should open the forum up to abuse like that.

If there's anything I can do to help CD with these spam threads, lemme know.