birthday / user list spam

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planetmaker
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birthday / user list spam

Post by planetmaker »

I'd like to suggest to have run on the database daily a script which bans the birthday list spam:

Users which
* only logged-in once, on the day they created their account
* and have a link in their profile

From my experience that'd remove like one to two dozen spammers per day.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Greyfox »

Hello planetmaker: I agree absolutely. Not only do I support this suggestion, but it might be an idea to ban showing websites in members profiles altogether. Obviously this has been abused, and must be stopped. If this is implemented, there are going to be some members who will be disappointed. But it's the usual story in life. "It's the minority that stuff it up for the majority". I hope Owen will post some thoughts on this.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by WWTBAM »

Greyfox wrote:Hello planetmaker: I agree absolutely. Not only do I support this suggestion, but it might be an idea to ban showing websites in members profiles altogether. Obviously this has been abused, and must be stopped. If this is implemented, there are going to be some members who will be disappointed. But it's the usual story in life. "It's the minority that stuff it up for the majority". I hope Owen will post some thoughts on this.
I don't think we should ban websites in user profiles. The only users that abuse the field in their profile are spam bots and occasional human spammer. I presume such a (spam cleaning) measure could be done daily after the nightly backup.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Greyfox »

Fair enough roboboy. However, I would still like to see Owen's comments on this point. I have recently contacted him through PM, after I found some links to sites that contain "inappropriate" material, considering the age of some of the members.
Windows 10 discussion here: http://www.tt-forums.net/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=72527
Looking for AMI trains, Chicago Locomotive Works, etc: You'll find your needs here: http://www.locomotiondepot.net/
Here's another: http://www.walter1940.de Lots of interesting stuff on this site, including tutorials.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Zakos »

The notifications are the best way to get rid of things like that. I've done that myself in the past, which roboboy can attest to. But not every spammer's profile has an ad for "Best Porn Site." Also, I recall Owen having said that it's really not necessary to do a full-scale wipe unless half of the users here have never made a post.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Greyfox »

It's something that needs to be monitored. Any spam.......then delete them.
Windows 10 discussion here: http://www.tt-forums.net/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=72527
Looking for AMI trains, Chicago Locomotive Works, etc: You'll find your needs here: http://www.locomotiondepot.net/
Here's another: http://www.walter1940.de Lots of interesting stuff on this site, including tutorials.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by WWTBAM »

We try to move as much of the spam out into the trash as possible. Sometimes it is not possible to remove enough of it to be effective eg when on a mobile device it is almost impossible to go through the memberlist. Also the memberlist almost becomes unmaintainable after a day or two of not doing it. I will have a look at it later.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by michael blunck »

@Greyfox, this is a well-known problem and had been discussed a lot. Unfortunately, since Owen´s last forums´ cleanup, there have already a lot of spammers being registrating.

Most of the time I visit tt-forums, there are no human beings active but only bots, spiders, and dozens of spammers "changing profile settings" (registrating).

regards
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by orudge »

A script to monitor the birthday list seems a good idea, I'll see what I can do with that.

I will perhaps also do another run through the memberlist to try to clear out some more spammers, similar to what was done a couple of months ago.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by WWTBAM »

Well most of page 1 when sorted by Join Date was spammers 7 out of 30 in fact.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by orudge »

By definition, 7/30 is just 23%, so not "most". ;) Still a reasonably significant percentage though.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by WWTBAM »

Whoopsie, meant to say 27 out of 30.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Redirect Left »

Do spammers have their posts deleted, or just moved to an admin only board of advertisements?

If they're deleted, then post count would be 0. So can you simply just if post count = 0, add a bit of code to ignore the user from birthday list. If they're moved, just check if all their posts are in an admin only section. Would kill off all the spam birthdays, no?

I've modified phpBB myself a few times, so I know its fairly simple to implement, just then maitaining the updates through phpBB updates.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by planetmaker »

Jolteon wrote:Do spammers have their posts deleted, or just moved to an admin only board of advertisements?

If they're deleted, then post count would be 0. So can you simply just if post count = 0, add a bit of code to ignore the user from birthday list. If they're moved, just check if all their posts are in an admin only section. Would kill off all the spam birthdays, no?

I've modified phpBB myself a few times, so I know its fairly simple to implement, just then maitaining the updates through phpBB updates.
Spammers with a post count != 0 are not that much of a problem. Those postings will be detected. And the people banned.
Spam postings are contained in a special board dedicated to spam. It's a failsafe measure to not inadvertly delete postings in the case of an error.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Redirect Left »

Well, it'd be easy to detect those spammers, or specifically the spam accounts, and drop them from the birthdays list, from my phpBB modding experience anyway.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by planetmaker »

Jolteon wrote:Well, it'd be easy to detect those spammers, or specifically the spam accounts, and drop them from the birthdays list, from my phpBB modding experience anyway.
They are not a problem. Banned accounts don't show there.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Redirect Left »

...I'm not really referring to banned people uniquely. The same can be applied to any users. Such as those that register but never post, no one really gives a hoot about their birthdays.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Chrill »

Jolteon does raise a valid point. Why show the birthday of a human who visited a few times in 2011 but never even posted? The birthdays we do care about would logically be the birthdays of users who actually post here. Such as me. :mrgreen:
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by WWTBAM »

I had a look at the member list earlier and there were 2 whole pages of presumably spammers.
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Re: birthday / user list spam

Post by Purno »

Chrill wrote:Jolteon does raise a valid point. Why show the birthday of a human who visited a few times in 2011 but never even posted? The birthdays we do care about would logically be the birthdays of users who actually post here. Such as me. :mrgreen:
Actually, I don't care much about the birthday list at all. If someone wants to celebrate their birthday here, we got a topic in off-topic. IMO this birthday lists causes more problems than it does good. But I guess one of the reasons I never use it is because it's quite rare to see a familiar name pop up there. Having a birthday listed there is nothing special. We got tens of them each day. :P
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