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spam has eased up in my inbox


RobiBue

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back in May 2018 I started receiving a slew of spew which peaked in the hundreds in June-August, where I finally got the Gmail faux-pas with 6to4 IPv6 problem completely figured out and was able to report correctly to the necessary abuse desks. The spam started diminishing again and now, finally, with a few oddballs, the last one so far I received was on 4 days ago! YAY!

Thanks for all that helped me figure out the IPv6 problem and that gave me tips and showed me tricks ;)

I believe in the end it has been a combination of SpamCop and manual reporting where SC didn't find the correct abuse desk or couldn't follow the region's whois server ("refuse to bother lacnic" or "apnic") because the address is/was an old grandfathered transfer from "internic"...

Anywho... 2 - 3 spams a week seems like a pretty good deal where it was over 100 a day...

if now, the forum spam could be handled the same way and reduced to nil... wouldn't that be great... not a question, just a loud thought ;)

I know, since SC deals with spam (duh) it would be pointless to implement a spam filter in the fora since many valid posts would be marked as spam (again duh) but there should be a way where newbies and forum spammers could be sorted out at the beginning, and have a few newbie posts get the warning that a forum admin will need to approve their post.

I believe that could work, as it would burden the admins less since they wouldn't have to take care of every forum spam -- at least I believe so...

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2 hours ago, RobiBue said:

but there should be a way where newbies and forum spammers could be sorted out at the beginning, and have a few newbie posts get the warning that a forum admin will need to approve their post.

I believe that could work, as it would burden the admins less since they wouldn't have to take care of every forum spam -- at least I believe so...

Of course it is possible to set the forum to require approval for all first post, spam or otherwise.  Admin would still need to look at each first/new post to process as spam or approve and/or respond.  The only difference would be members would not see spam and new members would have to wait until Admin approves their post before getting any help.  JMHO

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8 hours ago, Lking said:

Of course it is possible to set the forum to require approval for all first post, spam or otherwise.  Admin would still need to look at each first/new post to process as spam or approve and/or respond.  The only difference would be members would not see spam and new members would have to wait until Admin approves their post before getting any help.  JMHO

can't you whitelist anyone who posts 1 approved post? Just a suggestion, most of this spam flood is recognized as spam

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9 hours ago, Lking said:

Of course it is possible to set the forum to require approval for all first post, spam or otherwise.  Admin would still need to look at each first/new post to process as spam or approve and/or respond.  The only difference would be members would not see spam and new members would have to wait until Admin approves their post before getting any help.  JMHO

:( yeah, that's not what I meant though :( admins like you have already plenty on their plate, and I've noticed, there aren't many around... in fact, I've only seen two or maybe three admins around...

what I meant was, to make it easier on y'all, have the system automatically sort newbies and forum spammers maybe through a learning curve, which would in the end benefit the users and the admins. Of course, such a system would have to be written and implemented and I'm not sure if one like that already exists -- although I would think so...

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4 minutes ago, petzl said:

can't you whitelist anyone who posts 1 approved post?

Yes, that is what I meant to say.  We would set up a new group "Zero approved post" All new account would be in that group and their first post would hidden until approved before being visible on the forum. The current "newbie" group, 0-9 post, would be changed to 1-9 post.  As soon as a members first post is approved, they automatically change to the "newbie" group and all is the same as now.

The two difference this would affect are:

  1.  No one except Admin would see spam
  2.  A new member would have to wait until Admin approves their post before anyone could provide any help.

(2) This sounds benign, but in practice the forum seems to have members in time zones +1 UTC, long way around to +8 UTC.  Although I am in about the middle -7 UTC that still meant a new member with an urgent problem/question may have to wait 8, 16hrs? before anyone can respond with what may be a simple fix any other active member can provide.

(1) I would think that any member of this forum, 'knows spam when they see it' and will pass it by.  Adding a forum spam filter raises the issue of false-positives.  Though rare, we have had legitimate members/questions for time zones +2, +3 +5 UTC which would likely be blocked based on IP block or TLD like .ru etc.

Just my opinion. It has been a recurring topic for discussion.

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20 minutes ago, RobiBue said:

such a system would have to be written and implemented and I'm not sure if one like that already exists -- although I would think so...

To be user friendly, any automated sorting system would need to have the results reviewed.  For example,  how do you sort out, without hands on review, the difference between the spammer in an IP block, and the poor sap who uses the same ISP and is having their emails blocked because they are just 'in a bad neighborhood'?  Someone needs to explain the problem, the range of opionions, and maybe explain it in multilingual monosyllables.

I do appreciate your concern for my time.

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