Bob has worked his magic

[boblarson]

Have the mods & admins give us the spammer's email and we can sign him up for spams & other shady sites.

It would be a good idea IF we could be sure that the email address they provided is really theirs. A lot of spammers use compromised email addresses, so they are able to confirm the confirmation email but it really isn't their email address; the poor person who's email has been compromised gets the backlash.

Or, they went in right after doing the confirmation and change the email address listed to someone elses, or a bogus one.

 

[Banana]

Ooo, I had forgot about zombies.

On a bit more serious note- does the forum use any validation when new users register on to ensure they're not a bot?

I know that we can set forum to activate account only after an explicit permission from the admins/mods, but I remember we talked about that and it was shot down because it doesn't mesh well with forum's goal to help other people and forcing them to wait hours to answer a question.

 

[boblarson]

does the forum use any validation when new users register on to ensure they're not a bot?

We use CAPTCHA and an email link that has to be clicked or pasted into the browser. But, that is definitely not up to speed with keeping them out, I understand.

I don't think we can do anything else at this point. We are limited by the software. I don't know what else is available but Jon, the owner of the forum, isn't likely going to want to spend money to go get something else.

 

[statsman]

Our dart league site had a period of inundation. The webmaster put up a separate page before you could get to the message board. Kept out the automated spammers.

In order to sign up you had to answer a simple question about darts correctly.

Example: In darts, what is "fish and chips"
Answer: A score of 26.

These steps have worked wonders. A similar step could be introduced here such as a skill testing question in Access.

Question - A macro is:
A: a method of sifting data to obtain the results you want
B: a collection of instructions to run a series of tasks
C: a fish

Needless to say if you don't pick C you can't join.

 

[Banana]

Except that we'd be keeping out noobs who's screaming for assistance... And goodness, I know I'd flunk that macros, having never used it.

Not sure if that is a good thing or not.

 

[CraigDolphin]

Well, if the question was simple enough any human newbie should be able to get the right answer.
Like:
What company makes the Access database program?
A. Kellogs
B. What's Kellogs?
C. Choose answer d!
D. Micro$oft

Automated bots won't know the answer...any human newbie, idiot, or otherwise, would....

 

[Banana]

But this won't stop spammers- Boblarson says the forum already uses CAPTCHA for registration (those wavy letters on a picture), and I imagine they are efficient to keep bots out but spammers can just write a script so bot sends back a snapshot of hte page with the CAPTCHA and gives the correct arguments for bot to register and go with wreaking the havoc (and then there's spammers who don't use bots at all).

Those questions wouldn't stop them at all, and we would end up annoying more new users.

 

[CraigDolphin]

Well, yes, but then the spammers have to actually review each page manually...starts to remove the usefulness of bots if you have to actually view each site's page, then stop and think about the answer to a question. I agree it's not foolproof but it raises the effort-required bar a bit higher for the spammers.

And if a new user ends up annoyed, well, they say turn-about is fair play....plenty of new users have irritated me Most new posters are not here for kicks and giggles: they're here to get an answer to a question about access. I don't think too many genuine new posters will be so irritated by a one-off registration question that their need for an answer won't outweigh that.

 

[boblarson]

Well, yes, but then the spammers have to actually review each page manually...

ONLY if you mix up the questions each time and the answer is not the same letter each time. All they would have to do otherwise is do it manually one time first and then feed it to whatever script they have to get on.

 

[CraigDolphin]

Hmm. Well. Is that hard to do?

 

[boblarson]

Hmm. Well. Is that hard to do?

Yes, unfortunately. Only Jon can do anything about this and he doesn't visit much anymore. SJ only has limited powers around the site and Pat Hartman and I have even less than he.

I think we're pretty much stuck with what we have. Go ahead and put these suggestions into the suggestions forum and you never know, maybe Jon will see them and do something towards that end.

 

[CraigDolphin]

Ah well. Worth a thought. It's a shame that moderators from other forums don't have a front-end to your banned IP address db, Bob....maybe a collective approach to banning spammers would be even more effective. Nonetheless, you do a heck of a job and I greatly appreciate all your hard work.

 

[statsman]

And if a new user ends up annoyed, well, they say turn-about is fair play....plenty of new users have irritated me Most new posters are not here for kicks and giggles: they're here to get an answer to a question about access. I don't think too many genuine new posters will be so irritated by a one-off registration question that their need for an answer won't outweigh that.

Of course there was a time when YOU were a new poster.

I'm interested if you could have 7 easy Access questions and change the questions daily:
Monday - question about tables
Tuesday - question about queries
Wednesday - question about forms
etc.

Does everyone know you can report spam, ads, porno sites etc by clicking on the triangle in the top right corner.
Be sure to enter the forum name and the title of the post.

 

[boblarson]

Does everyone know you can report spam, ads, porno sites etc by clicking on the triangle in the top right corner.
Be sure to enter the forum name and the title of the post.

If you click the triangle to report spam, the moderators get an email with a link to that particular post anyway, so just entering the reason is fine. We'll be able to get to it.