Discussion and Action needed to handle spam wave

gomimin · Post by **gomimin** » Tue Jul 14, 2009 1:15 pm

What about disabling (password protect) registration page and deleting accounts?!?

Can't we make it that people only can register by invitation?!?

or secure (a little) by capture or e-mail account activation?

Thank you for cleaning up that mess!

Post by **Goggles** » Tue Jul 14, 2009 2:44 pm

Perhaps the Execs should make an official statement, but since they're letting me watch their forum and haven't kicked me for it yet, I'll share

- Disabling new user registration was considered a few days ago already, and was accepted as a viable short term solution to the issue. Unfortunately, no tool is apparently available in order to directly enact this. Doh!

- CAPTCHA style registration has been looked into in the past, but the current message board installation is custom, and adding modules (such as CAPTCHA) don't seem to like to play nice with the boards

- The current situation has renewed the discussion to simply upgrade the entire forum software. Possible available solutions are being inspected, such as vbulletin ($$) and phpbb3 (free).

- A TeamSpeak community meeting may be upcoming to bring everyone up to speed on the background gears that are currently spinning. Buuuuut, that's for the Execs to determine

Post by **Von_Krieg** » Tue Jul 14, 2009 3:15 pm

What he said!

Post by **BRUMMIE** » Tue Jul 14, 2009 11:01 pm

Sorry Gommi - I've always hated inclusivity so I tend to ignore it and think that everyone is reading what everyone wrote.

But to paraphrase vk - "what he said".

We will have a roadmap by the weekend.

Post by **.Sup** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 5:36 am

Reduce the number of threads that are visible to freshly registered members to one-to a thread where new members introduce themselves and are then accepted as full fledged forum members. It should be easier to monitor spam from within one thread.

gomimin · Post by **gomimin** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 6:49 am

TY to "everyone"

for the headup!

I'm available for helping setting up new stuff,...looking forward in having a TS meeting soon.

Post by **sushi** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 8:58 am

Thanks for offering your assistance rest assured we will get back to you once we know the direction we are going to take.

Post by **Ash2Dust** » Wed Jul 15, 2009 11:14 am

Couldnt a visual confirmation be required? Rather than adding a module, just create a static page with an artistic image that requires them to type "GC hates spammers!1!" as a registration password. When a wave seems to break thru, swap out the image. Manual work that has to be tested with each change, but may be less work than cleaning up after spammers.