DO NOT BUMP SPAM

[p1ngpong]

As many regular visitors of the site know we are forever waging a war against spam bots here. We are generally quick to exterminate them and their threads thanks to quick reporting by our members and vigilance by the moderating team and I would like to thank everyone who takes the time to bring spambots to our attention.

However tonight something happened that genuinely made me both angry and disappointed at the same time and also made me question the common sense of some of our most prolific and well known members.

A porn spambot made a thread on the forum with graphic images and links in its opening post. People proceeded to post in this thread not once or twice, but nine times.

So this thread was bumped to the top of the latest discussion tab and given more views nine times with idiotic posts ranging from the usual "reported" to people just thinking they are funny.

Let me make it clear:

DO NOT BUMP OBVIOUS SPAM UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, ESPECIALLY IF IT IS PORNOGRAPHIC!

Just report it!

Thanks.

I am going to take a few hours out to calm down before I take any action if any on the people who bumped that last thread, my immediate reaction being to suspend you all for your stupidity.

 

[smileyhead]

@GalladeGuy Friendly reminder: It's better to just click the Report button instead of calling an Admin, because tagging will also bump.

 

[ihaveahax]

@Froster please don't bump spam, just report it.

 

[Xenon Hacks]

Friendly reminder

 

[VinsCool]

*Ahem* People still don't get it.

 

[ihaveahax]

stop bumping spam, even if it's to tell others to stop posting in it, it's still bumping. thanks

 

[Deleted User]

Could people just have a little more common sense and know a spam account when they see one? We've been hit by a familiar face again and there's no doubt about it he's just out to seek the classic attention every spam account wants.

And to make matters worse, people are still intentionally replying to them and bumping the thread, probably in hopes to attract likes as usual! Unbelievable...

Come on guys, we're an intelligent community; let's not lose that trait! It's 2016 and this should be drilled into every mind that registered here!

 

[TotalInsanity4]

I was going to ask which "familiar face" it was but it was made readily apparent. Just report and move on, the account will either be banned or botted

 

[Davidosky99]

Don't forget, resist the will to post and just report

 

[ihaveahax]

@Xarec @MontyQ @migles @solress @pbanj @Davidosky99

just another reminder to don't bump spam, even if it's to tell others to stop posting in it.

 

[pbanj]

@Xarec @MontyQ @migles @solress @pbanj @Davidosky99

just another reminder to don't bump spam, even if it's to tell others to stop posting in it.

was only doing it so xarec would be thought of as a bot.

 

[migles]

@Xarec @MontyQ @migles @solress @pbanj @Davidosky99

just another reminder to don't bump spam, even if it's to tell others to stop posting in it.

where i did it D:

 

[ihaveahax]

was only doing it so xarec would be thought of as a bot.

you're still replying to spam though, which you shouldn't really do.

 

[Davidosky99]

where i did it D:

2 times?

 

[solress]

where i did it D:

by replying to the thread

 

[Frederica Bernkastel]

Catching spambots during registration is preventative, but isn't always robust and there's only so much staff can do at one time - So it might be worth looking at alternate reactive measures. Why not implement vote-based thread locking/hiding?

After a report threshold is met, if nobody has been able to manually action, a thread is locked (preventing bumping/potentially this could instead be changing the visibility of the thread?). When manually reviewed, the thread is exempted from further automatic actions.

XF API iirc supports this, and I'd wager an extension already exists along these lines.

Also, I have found that on a DNSBL perspective, the combination of Spamhaus XBL and DroneBL are significantly better at catching bots with a lower false positive rate than StopForumSpam.
Spamhaus Zen is even better, but is rife with false positives.

 

[migles]

Catching spambots during registration is preventative, but isn't always robust and there's only so much staff can do at one time - So it might be worth looking at alternate reactive measures. Why not implement vote-based thread locking/hiding?

After a report threshold is met, if nobody has been able to manually action, a thread is locked (preventing bumping/potentially this could instead be changing the visibility of the thread?). When manually reviewed, the thread is exempted from further automatic actions.

XF API iirc supports this, and I'd wager an extension already exists along these lines.

Also, I have found that on a DNSBL perspective, the combination of Spamhaus XBL and DroneBL are significantly better at catching bots with a lower false positive rate than StopForumSpam.
Spamhaus Zen is even better, but is rife with false positives.

heh, moderators are usually very quickly hunting theese bots, you never see a thread more than 5 minutes...
we just need to ignore and a moderator will get them..
theese threads are usually so badly or weirdly written that if you feel an urge to click the links, you shouldn't be in the internet...

vote-based thread locking IMHO is not a good idea, @Margen67 vins cool or others can create an evil gang and use this for their benefit

 

[Frederica Bernkastel]

vote-based thread locking IMHO is not a good idea, @Margen67 vins cool or others can create an evil gang and use this for their benefit

There's ways to make such a system work, for instance adding a scoring system where warn level is inversely proportional to vote weight. Other shit too, I feel it's a road worth exploring at the very least - If not locking then simply preventing it from being bumped might be an alternative (think along the lines of downvoting on reddit or saging on imageboards)

 

[Davidosky99]

There's ways to make such a system work, for instance adding a scoring system where warn level is inversely proportional to vote weight. Other shit too, I feel it's a road worth exploring at the very least - If not locking then simply preventing it from being bumped might be an alternative (think along the lines of downvoting on reddit or saging on imageboards)

So, you're implying that members with a high warning level are "worth less" than members with a lower warn level?
That system would never work, since it could always be rigged by someone or some group for any given personal or collective reason

 

[Frederica Bernkastel]

So, you're implying that members with a high warning level are "worth less" than members with a lower warn level?
That system would never work, since it could always be rigged by someone or some group for any given personal or collective reason

Cheers for the feedback.

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying and that is the reason why. Abuse the system, or commit other misdemeanours, and your warn level is increased. The warn level increase corresponds to the severity of your action, and a deliberate coordinated attempt to censor a user or thread will be caught by a mod might result in a greater penalty just as spamming reports might right now. In turn that makes abuse of the system more difficult in the future. Play nice and suddenly helping the mods respond to spambots might help you get rid of that warn you got a year ago for a goof gone wrong.

This of course presumes that locking or hiding is what mass reports trigger. I also put forward that it might be worth flagging a thread as unbumpable, which also changes its visibility and reduces potential disruption.

There's always the chance for abuse in a system and I don't recall claiming that this was a perfect suggestion. Just an idea!

 

[VinsCool]

vote-based thread locking IMHO is not a good idea, @Margen67 vins cool or others can create an evil gang and use this for their benefit

What the fuck...