Account Activation By Admin - Spam Problem

Hi there,

I'm having a bit of trouble on my forum with spammers. Basically they keep joining my site with spammy WWW links and dodgy location/signature texts. I set up the forum so that I have to approve their account, however it seems that this is not working - whenever I check the Member List it has new members on it, even though I haven't approved them by clicking on the link in my e-mail account.

I'm just wondering, will they be placed on the member list even before I have approved their account? And are they unable to post on the board until I have approved them?

Also, is there any other way I can stop them the spammers? I'm using pbpBB forum software.


Thanks for any help.

 

Get rid of phpbb. It's a spammers delight.

 

Or at least upgrade to the latest version.

 

Update, switch to other modern software, or create mods to prevent them from spamming. Pick one.

 

id go with MyBB or SMF. i can help you, pm me!

 

I don't know if this helps, but this is the link to my forum - Money Forum.

If you just click the memberlist you can see the amount of spammers that are joining my forum, and I can't really be bothered deleting them constantly.

I want a forum that I will be able to give a good SEO ranking to, and which has good protection against spammers. I don't mind paying a little, if that is what it will take.

Thanks for any more help

 

Hi,

What version of phpBB are you running ?

Quick Fix : Disable registration right now.

As of security, there is a Spam Words Mod for phpBB 2 and the equivalent one is being built for phpBB3 afaik..

Dont use captchas, they are going to be useless within a few months..

 

Ok, I checked your forum.. the captcha system for phpBB2 has already been broken, the one for phpBB3 is new and will work for a while.. In my website I have disabled registration through the forum itself, the problem lies in the standard registration process and the popularity of the phpBB boards. Prior to making my own registration process.. i had a custom image fields in the registration page that stopped the bots right there, but there is also the problem with human spammers that can pass through the registration process easily.

 

From one of your sig links..

http://hackforums.net/showthread.php?tid=9425

How ironic..

 

Upgrade to phpBB 3.0.0 - http://www.phpbb.com/downloads/olympus.php

That will hopefully sort out your issue.

 

Thanks for all the help.

Is anyone willing to help me upgrade to phpBB 3.0.0?

 

go to MyBB or vB!

 

It's pretty easy. Just follow the directions and you should be fine. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions though.

 

I had this exact same problem with one my boards. You have to update to phpbb 3.0 to get around it as already mentioned. If you get stuck just ask as I imagine quite a few people on this board have had the same problem!

 

Thanks for all the help, in the end I just moved to vBulletin because I felt it would be best for my forum anyway.

Thanks again

 

If we are already running phpbb 2, can we update to phpbb3 and keep our current forum messages?

 

I fail to see the irony. Hackers are certainly not spammers and my site runs mybb not phpbb. My site...doesn't have a spammer problem either. As a matter of fact NONE of my forums that run mybb have a problem with spam.

 

You have 10 members and a few posts. This is a brand new problem. It can't be much of an issue... this seems like promotion more then a valid question.

Anywho, if it is; my apologies. The easiest solution is a quickly installed mod that requires new users to NOT fill in their profile/signature/etc upon signup, which stops most registration bots in a heartbeat. You'll have to google that as I don't have it off the top of my head but it worked well for me in the past. It just leaves the fields open with a big message at the top to not fill them in.