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Registration settings updated

Posted: 30 May 2018, 19:34
by marcelk
We got some bot spam in the forums recently (now deleted) because the default phpBB setting is that new users are automatically accepted after e-mail verification. We now changed it to admin approval.

Re: Registration settings updated

Posted: 10 Jan 2019, 10:30
by marcelk
Advances in A.I. resulted in close to 10 spambot subscriptions per day making it past the captcha system. Just two months ago this was no more than one per day. So we changed the forum settings again: now subscribers must answer a Gigatron related question first. We've tested this for 2 weeks with great results: a couple of real subscribers got through and none of the spammers. It works so well I also removed the admin approval step. Lets see how it goes. If anyone experiences any issues, contact us by e-mail please. If anyone needs a car loan or cheap viagra, we now have plenty of addresses for that.

Re: Registration settings updated

Posted: 10 Jan 2019, 11:37
by Tor
(I'm a mod on another forum, and I've been a mod on older forums in the past)

Be aware that as soon as a spammer figures out the 'right' answer to 'insider' questions it will be distributed to other spammers and incorporated into their spam bots. On the forum I'm currently moderating I've seen the spam bots passing through the hurdles one by one and at the moment there's nothing stopping them (other than moderators).

Re: Registration settings updated

Posted: 10 Jan 2019, 12:51
by marcelk
Good point. It makes me wonder... if they're so clever, perhaps we can trick the bots to port Doom to the Gigatron in exchange for forum access.

Re: Registration settings updated

Posted: 10 Jan 2019, 15:03
by Tor
:-)

Yeah.. I think the only forum I've seen that is still totally immune to spammers is the Syncthing forum. I had to go through a whole interview with lots and lots of questions when I registered.

Re: Registration settings updated

Posted: 11 Jan 2019, 01:38
by jbailey
Doom.... I’d be happy for Wolfenstein 3D, now if you really want to push your luck how about Descent :D