spambots

[albionmoonlight]

Not sure what, if anything, can be done about them. But if nothing is done, then I see that as killing FOFC.

[JPhillips]

Dude, you have to take the opportunity to buy iPhones in bulk with Canadian dollars. This is your moment!

[ISiddiqui]

Are the mods not awake?

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

Are the mods not awake?

We mods are on strike, seeking a doubling of our pay. And Fresca.

But more seriously... I log onto this site nearly every day, and any time I see something that is clearly bot activity, I shut it down.

As nearly as I can tell, you tagged something as a bot at 12 noon my time, and when I went to check it out at 12:10pm, it had already been deleted.

If your standard is that a handful of volunteer colleagues are going to catch every single item in a matter of seconds, we are going to fail you. The mods are doing our best, and I'm sure we are doing what we can with technology to keep them out. If this site, with its occasional fluff post here or there, is so unbelievably miserable to visit for that reason... we are unlikely to ever be able to satisfy your demand for perfection. Sorry about that.

[Ben E Lou]

Yup. I also got the email at noon EDT on the nose, pretty much the same time as the post in question. Not sure what the expectation is around removal, but it's pretty much never going to happen in the time frame between the time it was reported and the time the post was made complaining about the lack of response.


Based on the ebb and flow of spambot activity, it's clear that the answer to the anti-spam question gets cracked periodically, is disseminated around botworld, and they come calling. There were 64 new registrations on 7/25. I change the anti-spam question/answer when I noticed high activity like that. I'm guessing I last changed the question on that day, because it dropped to 3 the next day, and has been at 2 or below since then until yesterday (10) and today (18). As of today it was

What is the name of the primary object from which earth gets its warmth (one word)?:sun

Coming up with something else now...

[albionmoonlight]

Great. Now I've got Black Hole Sun stuck in my head for the rest of the day . . .

[PilotMan]

The Steam group got nailed with a ton of stupid, auto posting hacked bot accounts last week to the tune of 150 flash announcements in about 48 hours all for CS:GO bullshit. It's under control now, but what a fucking annoyance.

[JonInMiddleGA]

I have no idea if it's the same spam I saw overnight but if it is, then I think I may see the issue perhaps.

There were two bot spams that I saw overnight - honestly the time escapes me (happens when you aren't sleeping and see the sun rise) but it would have been something pre-dawn I'm virtually certain.

One of the two appeared to be pretty nasty stuff from the title (to my rough translation eye anyway), to the degree that I didn't click to see if there was any comedy fodder inside.

Didn't bother to report it figuring, well, by the time a mod see any message they'll have already seen this crap & 86'ed it anyway.

If that stayed up until noon then I think it might point to a need for a mod or two that are, boardwise, morning people east coast time.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Ben E Lou

Based on the ebb and flow of spambot activity, it's clear that the answer to the anti-spam question gets cracked periodically, is disseminated around botworld, and they come calling.

So weird that this happens from time to time and that apparently the bots....tell one another the new answer? We haven't had any suspicious registration spikes since freakin' July 2021. The only days where we've even approached double-digit new users since then were right around the release of FOF9. But all of a sudden, the new user daily count did this:

January 26, 2024

Changing the anti-spam question now... *shurg*

[CrimsonFox]

Taylor Swift caused this.

[CrimsonFox]

Originally Posted by albionmoonlight

Great. Now I've got Black Hole Sun stuck in my head for the rest of the day . . .

and wash away the rain

[bhlloy]

What is funny is that when FOFC seems to get hit with a new waves of bots, I also seem to get slammed with a new round of phishing to my personal email. Or at least I've noticed it twice now, which isn't a ton but it's weird that it's at least twice.

New version of bot software released? Cyclical periods of attacks against certain resources? Some infrastructure vendor doing a good deal on compute? North Korea turning the power back on twice a year? Pure coincidence? All theories welcome.

[CrimsonFox]

Originally Posted by bhlloy

What is funny is that when FOFC seems to get hit with a new waves of bots, I also seem to get slammed with a new round of phishing to my personal email. Or at least I've noticed it twice now, which isn't a ton but it's weird that it's at least twice.

New version of bot software released? Cyclical periods of attacks against certain resources? Some infrastructure vendor doing a good deal on compute? North Korea turning the power back on twice a year? Pure coincidence? All theories welcome.

I'm certain Clarence Thomas will vote against protecting you from it

[jbpostbot]

wheres the love man

[Lathum]

we've got another one

[Ben E Lou]

Nah. It was created on 2/5, before I changed the questions. Sometimes those accounts wait for days to post. Sometimes they wait years, actually.

[Edward64]

1180 "guest" right now.

Something weird is going on.

[Mota]

I didn't know we were such a valuable demographic to target!

[MIJB#19]

Originally Posted by Mota

I didn't know we were such a valuable demographic to target!

They show a lot of interest in the "FBI Opens Investigation into Shooting of Michael Brown" discussion.