someone (tlabeotsbran) 10/10/2012 09:26:21 MDT
by Anonymous

is posting links to sites for item for sale , noticed becoming more prevalant, user is not a member just a fyi
and the links are not for any gear
not sure but the site admnin should remove the post

Parker,

While you are logged in and looking at one of these questionable posts click on the "center" Red Flag icon in the upper right hand corner of the questionable post. Then click Submit Report.

The forum moderators will take it from that point and rid us of this "bot".

Welcome to the forum. ;-)

Party On,

Newton

i have tried to do the red flag and it works but its like a full time job the post are coming in more and more and now from other annonymous users.
please block them they are ruining the members experience. with garbage adds.

if the spammer would just do a few posts to optimize his search engine response it wouldn't be so bad. Does this many posts make a big difference? Is he just trying to be annoying?

Somebody wake up the moderator or call in the Geek Squad!

These annoying SPAMS are probably sneaking in some back door in the software that puts those annoying little adds in under our posts. ;-?

There, I feel better now.

Party On,

Newton

Yeah... this reminds me of some discussions regarding the "vintage" of the software used for the BBS and CMS here.

In the short term, pending the agony of upgrade, the best thing to do is to ensure that you, when you see the spam, take the time for the red-flagging of the post. Don't rely upon others to have done it and don't worry if the Admins get a load of notices. If everyone does it, it's easier to find the posts and remove the user accounts. Trust me, I do it from the admin side somewhere else, all the time. (Less of a job with better BBS software)

Last time this happened, I just happened to be browsing the forum at the time and red-flagged at least 20 posts, which appeared faster than I could red-flag them.

A few days later, I noticed that the posts I had red-flagged were still there, but the username of the poster/spambot had been changed to "SPAM."

It appears from this past incident that BPL may now be doing this instead of deleting the spammer's posts. This stops future spam (until the spambot registers under a new identity and a different IP address), but does nothing to get rid of the many spam posts already there, which are truly annoying to the regular forum users. It also leaves the links in the spam posts available for the curious to click on, which is the whole reason for spamming in the first place--to increase the hits on a site.

I help moderate another forum, and I can assure you that on that one, as soon as a regular forum reader flags a post as spam, it will be pounced on, deleted and the spammer's IP banned. In fact, there have been a few amusing situations in which two or three of us are trying to delete the spam at the same time! The key is to have enough volunteer moderators. No, I'm not volunteering, because I am already committed to the other forum. However, with half a dozen more volunteers out there, our "friend" "SPAM" could be kept in check.

"However, with half a dozen more volunteers out there, our "friend" "SPAM" could be kept in check."

I've been making this same suggestion for months now. Perhaps you'll get more traction! ;-)

> i have tried to do the red flag and it works but its like a full time job the post
> are coming in more and more and now from other annonymous users.

If you think that is bad, think about the effort required to go through and delete them all!!!!

But please do report them, as I can ban the poster. Of course, he can register another name when I do that, so it's a bit of a war.

Cheers
Roger Caffin
Online Community Monitor
Backpacking Light
PS: should I ever meet one of these guys in a dark alley ... his marriage prospects will decrease.

The problem with not deleting spam posts, as I previously stated, is that some folks just can't resist clicking on links. That means that there are more hits to the sites, which is exactly what the spammer wants to accomplish. If the word goes out that spam posts here are not deleted promptly, you'll just get more and more and more! What you're getting here is obviously an automated spambot system whose operator has found fertile ground here.

That's why I suggested recruiting half a dozen volunteers to help moderate the forums. One or two people can't do it all!

I'm sure a lot of us would be willing to help you in that dark alley, too!

Edited by hikinggranny on 10/10/2012 21:41:02 MDT.

Agreed. I moderate a much more sensitive forum and have annoted many co-moderators. Everyone does only as much as they are sure of. Deleting such obvious spam is low-hanging fruit.

High-functioning moderators have jobs, families, and hopefully go BPing at times. For 24-hour coverage, I'd estimate 15-20 moderators would be needed to provide timely deletions of such advertisements.

Yeah, more moderators would help. More people means more coordination. More computers with potential for being hacked. (A hacked computer could do MORE damage than an inadvertent moderator.)

I do not think the current moderators do a bad job. They cleaned up yesterdays mess in fairly short order. Judging from the some of the headers, though, the spammer/hacker was fairly inept and it was likely a manual attack. A programmed attack could have really slowed the system down and added LARGE ammounts of spam to every subject, except those topics that are closed (Gear Swap, Lifer forums, etc.) He probably missed the time-between-posts rule, if he was programming the attack. He could automate a random name, registration and post his spam for several hours, before anyone locked him out. Note that sending address can be changed..."spoofing", difficult to trace except by hardware ID's. Even these can be changed, though...

A closed site would work far better. Simply moderating a new member would stop automated or semi-automated spamming. But this requires a LOT more work from the moderators...

"A closed site would work far better. Simply moderating a new member would stop automated or semi-automated spamming. But this requires a LOT more work from the moderators..."

Mary a.k.a. Hiking Granny can elaborate on this as the other forum that she helps moderate operates in this way. New "members" are moderated a.k.a. supervised until they have made a number of what I will call "worthy posts". After a decent number of good posts, I believe it is at least 10 or more, the noob is granted "full" member status.

I remember when I joined in on that forum it seemed like I'd never get to the full member status. I knew I had posted more than the minimum needed good posts and I was still stuck in noob status. I am now a full member of that forum.

When I joined BPL as a paying member I don't remember any such restrictions being placed on me. ;-?

Party On,

Newton

Yeah, that's fairly standard on the sites I moderate, too.

I moderate another forum and over there if you delete a user, you also have the option of deleting every one of the users posts at the same time.

I think closing the forum to require admin/mod approval of all new members would be too time intensive for the admin/mods and would bar legitimately interested people from the forum that don't feel like jumping through a bunch of hoops to register. We had our forum closed for a while, to prevent a particularly persistent troll from registering there again for the umpteenth time and it was effective. But that's a double edged sword. New blood is important to forum vitality. Old timers get bored and stop participating after they've become well versed in all the topics, new blood comes in and the forum keeps plugging along. When we closed the forum we had the people who got bored and left, but no new blood to replace them and the forum became quite slow. We opened it back up for that reason.

I agree that moderating new users is not a good idea with this forum as it requires much more timely and involved moderation otherwise 'guests' will leave before their posts go online.

I see quite a few non-deleted spam posts from the Tiffany lamp and replica watch and etc... postings of a few days ago. It is important, if one does not want more to arrive, that these posts are removed rather that only locked down.

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