Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 and Above [*Read First Post*]

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dicks
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by dicks »

Hi,

We operate a few boards on 3.0.5 with the following mods:

1. UTC+12 blocker
2. Anti bot registration
3. No more spam bots

Till today this has been very effective. Now I'm wondering if we upgrade to 3.0.6 and change the captcha to use Re-Captcha if I will still be needing all the mods? I'd much rather prefer a vanilla PHPB3 install because its easier to maintain.

Any recommdations and/or experiences re. this are appreciated.
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by jeanvallery »

Can you provide download links for the three items you have listed?
Thank you for your time.
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by Phil »

dicks wrote:Hi,

We operate a few boards on 3.0.5 with the following mods:

1. UTC+12 blocker
2. Anti bot registration
3. No more spam bots

Till today this has been very effective. Now I'm wondering if we upgrade to 3.0.6 and change the captcha to use Re-Captcha if I will still be needing all the mods? I'd much rather prefer a vanilla PHPB3 install because its easier to maintain.

Any recommdations and/or experiences re. this are appreciated.
reCaptcha should work fine for now.
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whoman69
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by whoman69 »

I've been hit hard by spammers of late on my small board. New members are invited so I know the email address of a new user before they even get on and have them with a user name that will be recognized. I have 6-12 spammers register everyday so I went to the measure that they would have to be admin approved to start posting. I don't find it any harder to do that than to have to delete their accounts anyway. If I simply ignore the requests to become active by these spammers will the backlog do anything bad to my forum? There should also be an option to deactivate the account instead of just one to activate.
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by Cpt. Blackbeard »

Just delete them. Then upgrade your Spam protection to prevent them from even registering, the tips here will do it if you apply them.
dicks
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by dicks »

@Captain James Stuart Newkirk: Are you using 3.0.5 or already 3.0.6 with Re-Captcha or one of the other advanced captchas?
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Mick
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by Mick »

dicks wrote:@Captain James Stuart Newkirk: Are you using 3.0.5 or already 3.0.6 with Re-Captcha or one of the other advanced captchas?
I believe we have to assume that 3.0.6 is in use as that is what the discussion is about n'est-ce pas?
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whoman69
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by whoman69 »

Cpt. Blackbeard wrote:Just delete them. Then upgrade your Spam protection to prevent them from even registering, the tips here will do it if you apply them.
With the damage done, the question remains if I just ignore those requests instead of taking the time to delete them all, does it have any negative effects?

I shall take the advice to upgrade my protections in the future.
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by stevemaury »

whoman69 wrote:
Cpt. Blackbeard wrote:Just delete them. Then upgrade your Spam protection to prevent them from even registering, the tips here will do it if you apply them.
With the damage done, the question remains if I just ignore those requests instead of taking the time to delete them all, does it have any negative effects?

I shall take the advice to upgrade my protections in the future.
It has no negative effect, other than taking up a little database space. You do realize that you can mass delete unactivated (inactive) users in mass from the ACP?
I can stop all your spam. I can upgrade or update your Board. PM or email me. (Paid support)
dicks
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by dicks »

Mixstar wrote:
dicks wrote:@Captain James Stuart Newkirk: Are you using 3.0.5 or already 3.0.6 with Re-Captcha or one of the other advanced captchas?
I believe we have to assume that 3.0.6 is in use as that is what the discussion is about n'est-ce pas?
And I thought 3.0.6 is very good at preventing bots registering... Not sure if I should update now and use a vanilla 3.0.6 board.
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by tbackoff »

dicks wrote:And I thought 3.0.6 is very good at preventing bots registering... Not sure if I should update now and use a vanilla 3.0.6 board.
You cant just install phpBB 3.0.6 and do nothing, you actually have to employ one of the techniques mentioned. 3.0.6 (in my opinion) is a must update.
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Mick
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by Mick »

dicks wrote:And I thought 3.0.6 is very good at preventing bots registering... Not sure if I should update now and use a vanilla 3.0.6 board.
3.0.5 was good at preventing spambots if you did something about it.
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  • "The good news is hell is just the product of a morbid human imagination.
    The bad news is, whatever humans can imagine, they can usually create.
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by ctrow »

I have a 3.0.6 board with Administrator activation set - I am getting an average of about 5 attempts a day by bots/spammers. I also have 2 custom profile fields for First Name and Surname and I notice with all of the automated attempts that these fields are simply being populated with the username. Can I modify the code somehow to reject any registration attempt where these two fields are set to the same value - ie First Name = Surname (I don't know too may people where that would be true)....

Thanks in advance

Chris
dicks
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Re: Preventing Spam in phpBB 3.0.6 [*Read First Post*]

Post by dicks »

Chris,

Do you use Re-Captcha or one of the other advanced captchas? Do the bots get throught?
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How to hide profile of members who have not yet posted?

Post by mattsson »

Hello,

I'm planning to implement some of the recommendations in this post to see if I can reduce the spam registrations in my phpBB 3.0.6 forum, especially adding custom registration fields.

However there's another recommendation I'd like to implement but I just can't figure out how. That is, how to hide profiles of users who have not posted, or at least hide the URL's in their profiles.

It seems I can assign to the newly registered users group, all members who have not yet posted. Posts in my forum are moderated so only legitimate users would have a post. But then, how to set permissions on that group, as far as having their profile viewed?

I found the group's permissions under the users and groups tab, but even looking in the advanced permissions, I can't find anything about "hide user profile from others."

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Carol
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