Frequent spammers

[VitalyT]

Just two days ago I was reporting one who spammed all over automatically article posts. And now a new one, under name rickykaleb1

Is TechSpot falling under more attention from spammers or your security system is out-of-date?

 

[mailpup]

Is TechSpot falling under more attention from spammers...

Not really. If you haven't seen more than a couple spammers lately, that's probably because you just happened to miss them or staff got rid of them before you had a chance to see them.

 

[Vilandra]

XenUtiles has worked well for me in blocking spammers. I get a lot but it's a tiny amount compared to the number that are blocked.

 

[Julio Franco]

We tried XenUtiles for a while but ultimately found it to be a bit buggy. We switched to a different add-on that integrates StopForumSpam API along with Akismet. I think that's working rather well though there's still some spam coming through.

mailpup, Broni, Matthew: FYI, this newer anti-spam add-on that we are using allows for keyword based filtering. Lately that's how I've been targeting spammers that include random messages with some link at the end, you know, the ones with the overly annoying Twilight avatars.

 

[Vilandra]

Whatever you are using is working very well I would say - if you didn't have it there would be easily 100 a day. What I want to know is: who actually pays any attention to these spam posts so that it's worthwhile enough for them to do it in the first place? There are so many nowadays that it's just ridiculous.

 

[cliffordcooley]

What I want to know is: who actually pays any attention to these spam posts so that it's worthwhile enough for them to do it in the first place?

What I want to know is why there is no organization devoted to shutting these people down. Programming a site to simply ignore them is BS.

 

[captaincranky]

What I want to know is: who actually pays any attention to these spam posts so that it's worthwhile enough for them to do it in the first place? There are so many nowadays that it's just ridiculous.

A preponderance of Google's business strategy is selling advertising. I'm of the opinion that at some point, the point of diminishing, or no returns on an advertising dollar has to be reached.

Conclusion? people who advertise have no sales resistance to the people who sell advertising opportunities. They buy into the created fantasy of enormous ROI. Advertising can obviously work, and work well. However, it likely only does so for the people, (read "large corporations"), at the top of the pyramid, (scheme). It has to eventually come to a point where there are more advertisers than potential customers.

A lot of these internet "Groupon" type promotions have good market penetration, but turn out poorly for small business owners. In these cases, if the deal is really good, you'll get plenty of responses, but run the risk of bankrupting your business in the process

More money is likely made selling advertising opportunities for male enhancement pills, than selling the pills themselves. Although with that said, the male ego is a wallet of opportunity ripe for the picking.

All of that notwithstanding, given the low cost and ease of sending an email, I imagine that spammers expect to send out 100,000 emails, to justify pulling off one really lucrative identity theft.

The spam that this site gets, "earn a million dollars working out of your bedroom", is obvious social engineering enticement. I just don't have the nerves required to follow these cookie trails, to be able to gauge the extent of what the ripoff would be......(wait for it)......Ladies first maybe?

 

[St1ckM4n]

Is there any particular thing that'd help when lodging reports on spammers? I usually say "Spam - xxxx reason", but maybe there's something that mods prefer to catch their eye.

 

[captaincranky]

Is there any particular thing that'd help when lodging reports on spammers? I usually say "Spam - xxxx reason", but maybe there's something that mods prefer to catch their eye.

Well, the report is summary, and the reason for it should be one of those, "truths we hold to be self evident". That said, I usually try to inject some humor into the report. But, that's part of my basic nature. If you need to drop a dime, might as well give the staff a laugh.

 

[mailpup]

St1ckM4n, all reports are seen by a moderator or administrator so there is no particular wording you need to use. A short explanation such as your example is sufficient and is appreciated. However, much like a post in a forum thread there is no certainty of when a report will be seen by a moderator so if it seems like a report is taking a long time to be acted upon, please be patient.

That said, sometimes a report will be received but not acted upon because the mod or admin will feel there isn't a problem or that the problem does not require intervention, at least not yet.