Maybe we need premoderation for newreg?

[Reploid]

This spamposts just getting out of hand. Mods remove them pretty fast, true, and yet I'm still tired of seeing this junk everywhere, which speaks of the magnitude of the problem. Does the engine allow that? At least for topics, if not comments.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Just blacklist some of the words/phrases they commonly use. It's always the same shit, the stuff they post is completely asinine (like advertising voodoo spells and hacking services) that no real user would ever post.

Sure, there are always ways around badword filters, but at least slowing them down would reduce the amount of spam.

Posting 5+ identical or near identical threads as these guys typically do is something that should be easy to detect as well. Just calculate the difference between the posts (use Levenshtein Distance or something similar). Would also prevent real users from posting multiple identical threads. If they can't spam multiple threads, that's a lot less disrupting to the users. One spam thread in recent discussions is a lot easier to ignore than the entire recent discussions box filled with spam.

I suggested we add a cooldown timer for new members to make threads. Most spambots are quick in and quick out, they don’t hangout for delays.

I could've sworn there already was one. Anyways, spammers are not opposed to waiting a week after registering an account, I don't think it'll help much. These guys are really determined.

 

[Jayro]

Agreed. So what's your solution to the problem?

My solution would be to restrict thread creation until certain criteria is met, like a post count of 10 or 20, and maybe some form of further verification by forcing them to post an introduction before they can move on to the rest of the forums? I dunno, just some ideas, but I think restricting new threads would be a good first start.

 

[JayPea]

My solution would be to restrict thread creation until certain criteria is met, like a post count of 10 or 20, and maybe some form of further verification by forcing them to post an introduction before they can move on to the rest of the forums? I dunno, just some ideas, but I think restricting new threads would be a good first start.

That's what I thought, initially. It's defo been quieter on the spam front since this thread went up so perhaps something along these lines, or other, has been done by the mods? Sure hope so.

OT: BTW, have to say, I love MediCat. IT professional since 1993. Used Lockpick many, many times. Kudos, sir/madam!

 

[Xdqwerty]

Doesnt that kinda exists already? iirc when registering you have to wait for your email to be verified

 

[KleinesSinchen]

Sure, there are always ways around badword filters, but at least slowing them down would reduce the amount of spam.

It stops them for a minute. Until they replaced "Call Girls" with some other Unicode characters looking almost the same (a bit weird).
Yes, this already happened (forgot to screenshot it and re-posting spam is not allowed anyway).My solution would be to restrict thread creation until certain criteria is met, like a post count of 10 or 20, and maybe some form of further verification by forcing them to post an introduction before they can move on to the rest of the forums? I dunno, just some ideas, but I think restricting new threads would be a good first start.

My solution would be to restrict thread creation until certain criteria is met, like a post count of 10 or 20, and maybe some form of further verification by forcing them to post an introduction before they can move on to the rest of the forums? I dunno, just some ideas, but I think restricting new threads would be a good first start.

Completely stopping newbies from creating threads (where they ask for help) is pretty much the death blow for a help forum.
Reminds of the Chinese version of Xiaomi HyperOS, which allows bootloader unlock only for those people fulfilling almost impossible criteria.

 

[rcpd]

My solution would be to restrict thread creation until certain criteria is met, like a post count of 10 or 20, and maybe some form of further verification by forcing them to post an introduction before they can move on to the rest of the forums?

My thought was to not only include a post count (10-20) but also not have a load of complaints to the community staff members also. Sure, someone can have a post count and an intro post, but then a bot can take over and just do what they're taught how to do. My solution is to allow them to post in threads (not create threads) up to 10-20 times, but also keep track of the times they've had people talk to forum staff members (moderators) about how bad/mean/offensive their posts are. From there, staff moderators can make the decision. Park them or let them drive. All depends on how they treat being here.

 

[Jayro]

Completely stopping newbies from creating threads (where they ask for help) is pretty much the death blow for a help forum.
Reminds of the Chinese version of Xiaomi HyperOS, which allows bootloader unlock only for those people fulfilling almost impossible criteria.

Fair. Maybe restrict them to there then, since we're trying to at least contain the spam as much as possible.

 

[KleinesSinchen]

Fair. Maybe restrict them to there then, since we're trying to at least contain the spam as much as possible.

That is like committing suicide because being scared of death.
[SARCASM]
How about a quiz about various homebrew/CFW topics? If a newbie doesn't get a perfect score in 25 random questions in 10 minutes the account gets deleted!
[/SARCASM]

Restricting new accounts to basically zero permissions, demoting newbies to petitioners, who have to prove themselves worthy of joining some "1337" group, is the end of a help forum.
======

I have to say I'm a bit disappointed by the lack of any "official" (staff) answer in this thread. Spam has become a real problem in the last few weeks and the usual "Just report it and move on." that has come up in similar topics isn't helpful in my opinion.

Constant spam might have a bad impact on reputation. Maybe Google will start blocking stuff due to their "Safe Browsing" (default on).

 

[SylverReZ]

There should be limitations on what new users can do when they join, such as not being able to create a new thread or post for more than ten minutes, as spam has been a highly erratic issue on this site.

 

[porkiewpyne]

Not on the dev team but my 2c as modstaff. Long story short, there are already measures in place to filter out spam. Have been for a while. As far as I am aware, they are continuously being tweaked, and even then there is a substantial number of false positives and negatives (as evident in those that slip past).

People were already complaining about the inability to post links as a newbie. Posting restrictions or manual account approvals will just make for a worse experience overall.

We do appreciate the feedback but at this point in time, we have nothing much to add to the conversation that hasn't already been addressed.

 

[KleinesSinchen]

Not on the dev team but my 2c as modstaff. Long story short, there are already measures in place to filter out spam. Have been for a while. As far as I am aware, they are continuously being tweaked, and even then there is a substantial number of false positives and negatives (as evident in those that slip past).

This means the technical/automatic possibilities are exhausted and the situation can't be improved?
Well. Okay then. Thanks for letting us know.



Related a recent incident showing:

These guys are really determined.

Yes. They are. REALLY.

Protect your account. Use a strong password and consider enabling 2FA.
Spammers seem to be trying to capture existing accounts.

To the mods:
I take the risk to post a screenshot. There is no contact data or anything that could be helping spammers (as in re-posting the spam) or identify the account abused.
If it's still not okay, just remove it. I want to share it as a general warning.



A spammer just necrobumped an old thread with the same account that replied last in 2015 by posting dating nonsense.

Spoiler

Of course there are thousands of unused accounts potentially vulnerable to attacks due to bad passwords. But for active users it is a good reason to think of your account security. Don't make it easier for them.

 

[linuxares]

We sadly seen an increase of hijacked accounts spamming

 

[CMDreamer]

Well, considering how many GBATempers are around at any given time during the day, reporting would solve the issue at some extent, if just all Tempers would just report it at fisrt sight. Sadly that's not the case, I've seen many users posting on those SPAM threads, including nonsense to offenses to some level.

I'd say we, as GBATemp users should help moderation by reporting and moving ahead asap we see those kind ot SPAM. Moderators would do what they consider necessary.

One thing to add, is that on those threads a report counter should be added, so Tempers know if that thread has been reported already or not, and such thread should be closed for new comments after it has been reported automatically. Admin can add some sort of "trustability" to some level users (up to some level) so those threads reports are legit and not coming from some angry dastard trying to cause a mess on some thread.

We, as users should help keeping this site as useable and clean as possible.

 

[Jayro]

I got hacked in 2021 because a once-trusted video downloader extension for chrome decided to go rogue and become a keylogger, uploading my saved account login data to the dark web. They targeted by paypal relentlessly, and even went as far as to submit an appeal against my former employer to get my unemployment money from my unemployment account, lol.
I would wake up every day fighting hackers to change my passwords, enable 2FA, and recover my stolen funds/account changes. This went on for two months before they gave up. And I feel lucky, because they really could have done much, much worse if motivated. Ultimately I lost my gmail account permanently because they enabled 2FA on the google authenticator app, locking me out of that account for good. And since Google sign-in was how I logged in to play Pokemon GO, I lost that account along with it.

So PLEASE, setup 2FA on all your accounts where possible. It's annoying as hell, but very much worth it.

 

[SylverReZ]

Protect your account. Use a strong password and consider enabling 2FA.
Spammers seem to be trying to capture existing accounts.

That has also occurred frequently here. If an older account without two-factor authentication has the same password as a previous data leak, accounts can be compromised that way. I remember when some new and regular members, not bots, began posting links to Telegram crypto groups on quite a few threads about a year ago.

 

[The Real Jdbye]

Well, considering how many GBATempers are around at any given time during the day, reporting would solve the issue at some extent, if just all Tempers would just report it at fisrt sight. Sadly that's not the case, I've seen many users posting on those SPAM threads, including nonsense to offenses to some level.

I'd say we, as GBATemp users should help moderation by reporting and moving ahead asap we see those kind ot SPAM. Moderators would do what they consider necessary.

One thing to add, is that on those threads a report counter should be added, so Tempers know if that thread has been reported already or not, and such thread should be closed for new comments after it has been reported automatically. Admin can add some sort of "trustability" to some level users (up to some level) so those threads reports are legit and not coming from some angry dastard trying to cause a mess on some thread.

We, as users should help keeping this site as useable and clean as possible.

Mods also have to sleep sometimes. I've noticed that the spammers seem to have figured out the best time of day to not have their posts immediately removed. Reporting doesn't help if nobody's awake to check the reports.

Adding to that report counter idea, new users' ability to post could be limited temporarily if they are reported X number of times, reducing the amount of spam without requiring a mod to be around. Once a mod checked the reports in the morning, they could either unflag the account or ban it. This could also help limit new users trying to farm their post count by spamming and shitposting.

Additionally, new users could be restricted in how many threads they can post. Say 2 threads per 4 hours for example (not counting the introductions section, which could have its own 1 thread limit since users should never make more than 1 thread there anyways, unless perhaps if they've been away for an extended period of time and are just returning). I can't think of any situation where a new user would legitimately need to post multiple threads in rapid succession, but spammers do it all the time. Limiting that means it's likely a mod would be awake to deal with them before the timer was up allowing them to spam more. Could also make it so this timer is extended if your thread is reported.
This by itself wouldn't help that much, spammers would simply reply to existing popular threads if they weren't allowed to post new threads. So it would need to be combined with the previous suggestion to be effective.

 

[SylverReZ]

Mods also have to sleep sometimes. I've noticed that the spammers seem to have figured out the best time of day to not have their posts immediately removed. Reporting doesn't help if nobody's awake to check the reports.

Adding to that report counter idea, new users' ability to post could be limited temporarily if they are reported X number of times, reducing the amount of spam without requiring a mod to be around. Once a mod checked the reports in the morning, they could either unflag the account or ban it.

Even though I've played cat and mouse with the forum activity logs to report spam bots and bad behavior, moderators never take action when they're either asleep or busy.

Reducing the amount of report flooding is a good idea, as Jdbye suggests. This will allow moderators to handle one report at a time instead of having to handle multiple of them.

 

[The Catboy]

Not on the dev team but my 2c as modstaff. Long story short, there are already measures in place to filter out spam. Have been for a while. As far as I am aware, they are continuously being tweaked, and even then there is a substantial number of false positives and negatives (as evident in those that slip past).

People were already complaining about the inability to post links as a newbie. Posting restrictions or manual account approvals will just make for a worse experience overall.

We do appreciate the feedback but at this point in time, we have nothing much to add to the conversation that hasn't already been addressed.

I honestly think a cool down between threads would be potentially helpful. New users shouldn’t be allowed to make multiple threads immediately after joining. I feel like that should be a privilege gained after a set amount of posts are made.
Or even cool down on posting, so they can’t spam preexisting threads. Just something to slow them down so they aren’t rapidly spreading and can be reported before making a mess.
If that’s not a viable idea, then maybe more staff. Possibly a lower ranking staff members who just have the ability to nuke spam accounts.

 

[BigOnYa]

I say let @SylverReZ and @The Catboy be our "Spam Dream Team". Give them spam deleting privileges.

 

[The Catboy]

I say let @SylverReZ and @The Catboy be our "Spam Dream Team". Give them spam deleting privileges.

I really don’t know if I want to know what the staff has said about me, ngl. I’ve been a pretty shitty person to them on multiple occasions