Recently, I activated a means for registering for this site as a means for combatting spam. The spam to this site has become ridiculous, with almost 100 spam comments a day- everything from pharmaceuticals, to porn, to comments in Chinese and Russian. So I thought maybe having people register in order to make comments was considered.
The problem now is that I was getting about 20 spam accounts trying to register everyday. It was bad enough at that level, but today I had over 100 fake accounts register. They all come from the same email domain: imailfree.cc.
There are numerous solutions to this, and I am not sure where I am going to go with this, but SPAM has become a major problem that I will need to find a solution for.
13 Comments
Big Ruckus D · June 23, 2023 at 5:16 pm
One wonders if this is is some sort of operation intended to kill off “inconvenient” blogs that are outside the grasp of normal deplatforming means (like wordpress and blogger accounts going *poof*). If they can frustrate the site admin into shutting down from the flood of spam, or at least make the site unreadable with excessive bullshit for it’s core audience, then mission accomplished, eh?
I’d not discount it, everything has been weaponized now.
Red · June 23, 2023 at 5:30 pm
Spam is not any fun even when fried thin and crispy. I ran a poetry board back in the early 2000’s.
The spam got a bit crazy until I started blocking email addresses, IP addresses and Names.
I wish you all the best in dealing with it.
Jen · June 23, 2023 at 5:43 pm
Sorry! 😕
Explore Nature · June 23, 2023 at 8:08 pm
Block entire domains.
Didn’t the ever so busy nurse give up on it or are these some minions?
Divemedic · June 23, 2023 at 9:11 pm
You can block domains or IP addresses from commenting, but not from registering, at least with the plugins that I have installed. I will be installing more plugins that will allow me to filter out spambots.
EN2 SS · June 23, 2023 at 10:41 pm
From my days years ago of running a site, several trusted cohorts would pitch in so the load didn’t get to onerous.
Big Country · June 23, 2023 at 11:09 pm
I got the Same issue, but how do you block a domain?
What plugin do I need? I feel like a moron with running the dashboard LOL
Divemedic · June 24, 2023 at 7:42 am
To block a domain, a user, or an IP from commenting, you can enter it in the “Disallowed Comment” section found in Settings>Discussion menu on the dashboard.
As soon as I find a plugin for controlling registration, I will let you know.
BobF · June 24, 2023 at 4:16 am
Sucks. Wish there were something users could do to assist, but obviously that is all behind the curtain. If it ever gets to the point that you look for assistance I’d bet there are quite a few of us who could afford some time for it. Your blog is a valuable resource and is appreciated by many, something I hope you do not lose sight of.
Miguel GFZ · June 24, 2023 at 4:49 am
Askimet doesnt work for your blog?
Divemedic · June 24, 2023 at 7:43 am
It hasn’t been filtering the more problematic ones.
D · June 24, 2023 at 1:57 pm
Consider dealing with these “problem” countries with a simple sledgehammer appropach.
Go download a list of IP blocks by country and feed them in to your server’s firewall.
Every single network I manage has a blanket block on China, Russia, most of eastern Europe, and a few South American countries.
I mean…how many of your readers are in Russia, China, Crimea, etc…? Just block ’em. In terms of a “random English-language blog in the United States”, you probably don’t care if some random potential new reader can’t reach it from Uzbekistan…if there ever will be one…
Han Shot First, He Was No Fool · June 26, 2023 at 11:59 pm
The Internet is a multi-jurisdictional information sewer system.
Any clever scheme meant to keep idiots in check will eventually be wrecked by clever idiots who will plunge the crap into your network.
Try blocks by ASN if you have pfSense or something similar, that lets you block based on the entity AS number rather than what country they’re coming in from.
A persistent multi-jurisdictional pest we had to deal with went away easily once we blocked a single ASN in pfSense.
It also probably wouldn’t hurt to block Facebook first just to watch it work.
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