# Blogs are full of spam



## pawsplay (Aug 2, 2010)

I can only report one spam every 60 seconds, so it might be more useful for a mod to get out the mop and bucket and go after Blogs. There's quite a few in there.


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## Plane Sailing (Aug 7, 2010)

Thanks for the heads up. I've banned a dozen or so. It would be nice to prevent those guys from signing up, they seem to be bypassing security more easily now.

Cheers


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## Dannyalcatraz (Aug 8, 2010)

I saw this and thought...

[_Dave Bowman_]"My blog, it's full of spam!"[_/Dave Bowman_]


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## pawsplay (Aug 9, 2010)

My hovercraft is full of eels.


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## Plane Sailing (Aug 10, 2010)

My plane is full of snakes?


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## Morrus (Aug 10, 2010)

Plane Sailing said:


> Thanks for the heads up. I've banned a dozen or so. It would be nice to prevent those guys from signing up, they seem to be bypassing security more easily now.
> 
> Cheers




Yeah - there's a random question that a new user has to answer, and they seem to be actually answering them (easy stuff like days of the week, etc.)

Maybe the questions need to be harder?


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## Plane Sailing (Aug 10, 2010)

Morrus said:


> Yeah - there's a random question that a new user has to answer, and they seem to be actually answering them (easy stuff like days of the week, etc.)
> 
> Maybe the questions need to be harder?




Sounds like slightly harder questions might be in line.

Are they generic questions which vBulletin includes as anti-spam, or are they ones that we have set ourselves? Perhaps some vaguely RPG related questions?


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## Morrus (Aug 10, 2010)

I chose them myself. Here's what we have at present:

What is the third letter of the alphabet? 
Type this number in digits (not words): forty two 
Type in any one of the seven days of the week 
How many legs does a dog have?

I worry that a newcomer to gaming might struggle with RPG-related questions.


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## jaerdaph (Aug 10, 2010)

Morrus said:


> What is the third letter of the alphabet?
> Type this number in digits (not words): forty two
> Type in any one of the seven days of the week
> How many legs does a dog have?




Thank goodness I joined years ago when the standards for membership were lower - I'd never be able to pass an exam like that today!


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## pawsplay (Aug 10, 2010)

Morrus said:


> I chose them myself. Here's what we have at present:
> 
> What is the third letter of the alphabet?
> Type this number in digits (not words): forty two
> ...




Sadly, a bot could probably handle those. If nothing else, it could keep retrying until it got the alphabet one. It would be trivial for a script to know to answer "C" any time the phrase "third letter" and "alphabet" appear in the question. And if not a bot, then hired hands who can speak a smattering of English and sign up for blogs all day.

You could make it harder without asking for a lot of RPG knowledge or engaging in riddles.

RPG stands for role-playing ___ ?
Type either word that the D's in D&D stand for:
Type, in words, any possible result of 1d6:


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## Morrus (Aug 14, 2010)

Here's what I've gone for:

What is the last name of the current US president? 
What is the capital city of the UK? 
Dungeons & -- WHAT? Complete the name.  
How many legs does a dog have?


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## Merkuri (Aug 14, 2010)

Morrus said:


> What is the last name of the current US president?




Will you remember to change this one every 4-8 years?


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## Morrus (Aug 14, 2010)

Merkuri said:


> Will you remember to change this one every 4-8 years?




You'll have to remind me...

At least I know London ain't moving ever!


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## TarionzCousin (Aug 15, 2010)

Morrus said:


> At least I know London ain't moving ever!



Um, actually it's "Londinium." You Brits are just squatters there.


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## pawsplay (Aug 16, 2010)

Morrus said:


> Here's what I've gone for:
> 
> What is the last name of the current US president?




I have a feeling current%president is probably within the capabilities of many bots.



> What is the capital city of the UK?




I suspect this is within the capabilities of some bots, but not necessarily all gamers.



> Dungeons & -- WHAT? Complete the name.




This is pretty good.



> How many legs does a dog have?




*shrug* I don't know how often this is used as a security question. 

I like the idea of mildly game-related questions, which would probably slow down the spammers, as well. Like:

The plural of die (the random sort) is ___? (How many spambots are going to know that one? Or underpaid spammers?)

In any case... the spammers are back.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Aug 16, 2010)

> Dungeons & -- WHAT? Complete the name.




Drag Queens?

(FWIW, that is SO what I want to do as a campy comedic D&D film...w/Richard Fairbass of Right Said Fred in the Damodar role, Rupaul replacing Damon Wayans, and Elton John one-upping Jeremy Irons...maybe even with John Waters ghostwriting.)


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## pawsplay (Aug 18, 2010)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Drag Queens?
> 
> (FWIW, that is SO what I want to do as a campy comedic D&D film...w/Richard Fairbass of Right Said Fred in the Damodar role, Rupaul replacing Damon Wayans, and Elton John one-upping Jeremy Irons...maybe even with John Waters ghostwriting.)




"We looted this good!"
"Way to go, baby!"
"As adventurers, we enjoy our rightfully gained plunder!"
"Death to monsters!"
"DEATH TO MONSTERS!"
"Hey, look! Kobold babies."
"There's only one thing I hate worse 'an kobolds, an' it's kobold babies! Gimme that sticker!"


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## MichaelSomething (Aug 28, 2010)

The spam blog just keep coming!  It's like dealing with Tucker's kobolds!


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## Legildur (Aug 30, 2010)

Wouldn't it be sweet/ironic to hire one of the spammers to spend their time cleaning the blogs of spam?

However, I realise that that is rewarding the culprits to a degree...


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## MadLordOfMilk (Sep 2, 2010)

Ideas, though it pains me to post them publicly where the people making the bots could just check 


What is the name of this website?
You are registering for a ______. ("forum," "messageboard," "website" etc)
What are gnomes good for? ("nothing," "stew," and "punting" are all acceptable)


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## Piratecat (Sep 3, 2010)

I just deleted a bunch. It's annoying; deleting spam blogs is more of a pain than deleting spam posts, because there's no "delete blog and ban user" choice.


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## Piratecat (Sep 3, 2010)

By the way, thank you for reporting these as you come across them. If there are multiple spam blogs by the same person, just report one and we'll get all the rest automatically.


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## fba827 (Sep 4, 2010)

Piratecat said:


> If there are multiple spam blogs by the same person, just report one and we'll get all the rest automatically.




i was wondering about that -- good to know  (and knowing is half the battle) 

thank you for your tireless efforts against evil spam -- why is it evil? because it steals candies from babies and kicks puppies!  And, what's worse, I hear that spam doesn't play D&D.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Sep 5, 2010)

fba827 said:


> thank you for your tireless efforts against evil spam -- why is it evil?




Because even spam-loving vikings don't love it.


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## pawsplay (Oct 17, 2010)

pawsplay said:


> And if not a bot, then hired hands who can speak a smattering of English and sign up for blogs all day.




I knew it!

Spammers Use The Human Touch To Avoid CAPTCHA : NPR


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## Relique du Madde (Nov 2, 2010)

OMG!!  Divide by zero!!  Spam in a thread about spam!


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## darjr (Nov 2, 2010)

Heh, one time there was a spammer that came back to a thread and posted something actually interesting and useful.


Then they came to their senses and erased it and filled it with links.


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