Ban all gmail "multiple dot" users

[vatreni]

Current: 3.3.9
Planned 3.3.11

My query is a follow-up on viewtopic.php?t=2167909 from many years ago.

I have a Q&A spambot question in place, but this isn't stopping real (shady) people signing up with
[email protected]
[email protected]
etc etc

Banning by IP, email and even country (I have Filter by country extension) isn't working as they are obviously using VPNs to keep popping up all over.

I don't want to make the Q&A question so difficult as to be ungoogleable, so I'm wondering if the idea to ban

*.*.*.*@gmail.com
or even
*.*.*@gmail.com

still works, as I don't know any genuine gmail users who have more than one dot, so happy to rule out any gmail address with 2 dots or more.

[Mick]

Can you post a link to your board please?

[thecoalman]

There is no way to do this with phpBB, you'd need a extension or some custom code.

For custom code search for the function function validate_user_email in /includes/functions_user.php

[Mick]

I don't want to make the Q&A question so difficult as to be ungoogleable

Thats exactly what it needs to be, ungoogleable, I found the correct answer to your Q&A first hit, if I can so can the bots and that’s where your spam is coming from.

[exemplary1]

I don't want to make the Q&A question so difficult as to be ungoogleable, so I'm wondering if the idea to ban

For Q&A, you can create difficult/random multiple Q&A, create a post where all Question-Answers are and provide a link on registration form to it, if your forum is visible without registering. So user can open the post to find answers. No need of Googling.

[warmweer]

...
For Q&A, you can create difficult/random multiple Q&A, create a post where all Question-Answers are and provide a link on registration form to it, if your forum is visible without registering. So user can open the post to find answers. No need of Googling.

You've lost me there.
I thought the point was to prevent/minimise spam registrations, not to reduce the efficacy of antispam measures

[exemplary1]

...
For Q&A, you can create difficult/random multiple Q&A, create a post where all Question-Answers are and provide a link on registration form to it, if your forum is visible without registering. So user can open the post to find answers. No need of Googling.

You've lost me there.
I thought the point was to prevent/minimise spam registrations, not to reduce the efficacy of antispam measures

I was thinking about stopping auto-bots capable of finding answer from AI (chatgpt like). Some of the bots might have capability of googling the answer.
Yes, it can be programmed to open link and get answer, too. But its less likely someone doing for just one forum.
One can scramble the answer to make it difficult for bot.

[warmweer]

Just about anything visible to the public is also visible to bots (bots are recognised by the user_agent >>> unknown user_agent = Guest and the spambots change user_agent regularly).

Also you're making it a piece of cake for human spammers by providing the answer to the QA.

[Kailey]

For Q&A, you can create difficult/random multiple Q&A, create a post where all Question-Answers are and provide a link on registration form to it, if your forum is visible without registering. So user can open the post to find answers. No need of Googling.

That's really problematic advice.

A good, single Q&A will stop spam registrations and if they do happen to break the Q&A, simply change the Q&A. Multiple Q&A questions make it difficult to track down which one allowed the successful registration. There are also multiple anti-spam extensions that can assist in stopping spam.

[exemplary1]

I was in impression that multiple QA is a better choice (Actually I do have multiple QAs, but my forum is yet to get some decent traffic, so no spamming problem yet).
But for tracking purpose, of course, not a good idea.

[vatreni]

I presume you all run forum(s).

A forum for enthusiasts of ABCDE should be reasonably accessible and open to people who are mildly interested in ABCDE as well as those who know it intimately. How on earth would you propose I find a question whose answer is known to this cohort, but not to google or ai?

Let's give an example ABCDE. The Triumph Dolomite. Note this isn't my forum but happens to be a phpbb forum with a Q&A. How many wheel nuts does a Dolomite have in total?

This is googleable and chatgpt-able in seconds. What ungoogleable question would you suggest that would let genuine people in, but keep out spammers? I can't think of one.

[KevC]

You can ask a question about something in the logo. You can ask for a word somewhere on a page, like the first word of the first forum etc. Those kinds of questions need some understanding and logic of how to work out the answer. AI is not so good at those.

[Mick]

How many wheel nuts does a Dolomite have

This is easy for a bot, first try one, nope, try two, no, try three, doubtful, try four - Bingo I’m in!!

[exemplary1]

What ungoogleable question would you suggest that would let genuine people in, but keep out spammers? I can't think of one.

Here,
viewtopic.php?p=15996874#p15996874

Also one my question is, what is the name of my website ? Although being a new forum, I dont have much traffic, I would remove the question if my forum suddenly starts getting spams.

[KevC]

Here,
viewtopic.php?p=15996874#p15996874

If that question works for you that's fine but as you can see from the AI responses, there isn't ONE definitive answer that 'most' people might think of.

Hopefully the website name question works ok but again there's some ambiguity for people answering. Do you mean (for example) http://www.tropicalfishemporium.com, or www.tropicalfishemporium.com, or Tropical Fish Emporium or THE tropical fish emporium, or tropical fish, etc etc.