We going to do anything about these spammers?

SuperFromND

They seem to have been banned now, but I'd keep one eye open.

SgtJimmyRustles

@supercatfooz

Hasn't even been an hour and they're back at it.

SuperFromND

phulshof

I had the same problem on the RetroFE forums. I'm not sure if it's an option here, but I got rid of practically all of them by adding a few simple questions to the registration process involving simple mathematical problems using letters only, e.g. "How much is two times two?" with the correct answer being "Four". Practically any human can answer those; the bots so far cannot.

BuZz

The spammers are not bots. They use people. I disabled some of our anti spam stuff due to it flagging legit posts. The issue will likely improve in a few days. Happened before.

Hyruleslink

One way that may assist in stopping spammers is to not allow new users to post for a few days. That may also help reduce the amount of "HELP!! HOW DO I..." posts as well by forcing users to look up common issues that have been answered numerous times.

Rookervik

This is how Kim Jong Un is attacking the US :D

PokeEngineer

@rookervik said in We going to do anything about these spammers?:

This is how Kim Jong Un is attacking the US :D

More like the UK! Bwahahaha!

meleu

@buzz downvoting and flagging for moderation as spam is a good practice for us, regular users, or there's no difference?

phulshof

@buzz said in We going to do anything about these spammers?:

The spammers are not bots. They use people. I disabled some of our anti spam stuff due to it flagging legit posts. The issue will likely improve in a few days. Happened before.

Are you sure about that? I had them breaking through my captchas as well, but as soon as I added these simple questions they were all gone. Bots are quite clever these days, but apparently understanding the English language is still a tad too much to ask. :)

dankcushions

https://retropie.org.uk/forum/user/jghfgff05 managed to get 40 posts of junk through.

i'd be tempted to ban all chinese(?) character posts, if that's possible. this stuff seems to appear with some regularity.

ideally there would be a 'delete all posts' option for moderators to use, as going through each post and deleting takes ages :(

AndrewH

If there's a need for an additional moderator or two, I'd gladly step forward to provide some additional coverage.
As long as the vetting procedure isn't too invasive :-)

mitu

@dankcushions said in We going to do anything about these spammers?:

ideally there would be a 'delete all posts' option for moderators to use, as going through each post and deleting takes ages :(

Doesn't deleting an user automaticaly delete his/her posts ? That might be an option for proven spammer accounts.

jonnykesh

@mitu Banned users comments remain. I see them from time to time with the red Banned flag beside them.

mitu

@jonnykesh Not banning, but deleting the account completely.

BuZz

@dankcushions Admins can quickly delete a user and all posts - perhaps not available for moderators. I'm surprised akismet didn't catch them either. I will see if there is a way to allow mods to do this as it takes just a few seconds. I have little time for working on the forum right now though.

herb_fargus

@buzz I've deleted at least 5 accounts. Seems at least a new one each evening :/