I am being spammed and i can not stop it?

[Bruce the Shark]

Hi
I am such a noob here. please bear with me.
Today i notice i was spammed with 1267 post on my site in one of my general board so i decided to delete that board thinking it might stop.
Yeah right as if.
Now after a few hours i have noticed that another board is being flooded with  the  very same useless garbage which i am powerless to stop it.
I have now another 2407 post of spam taking this to a total 3674 post in one day.
I tried looking to see what  the ip address is to ban this person but i am finding nothing.
To you guys who are more experienced than me could you please help me out a bit.
I am sort of panicking and struggling now
Thanks
www.easyrider.tk

[Bob Perry of Web Presence Consulting]

First piece of advice, don't panick...

Second piece of advice, learn to use the search feature, this topic is covered in many threads here on the support system...

Lastly, if you enjoy running your board, get use to the idea of spending a great deal of your time searching the support site, its a VERY powerful platform and you have absolute control over what gets posted and what does not...

[Bruce the Shark]

I agree but being new here i fear the worst and should my site be completely wiped out i prefer to ask the support team for help.

[Kindred]

search is your friend.

the wiki is your friend

http://wiki.simplemachines.org/smf/Spam_-_my_forum_is_flooded_with_spam,_what_can_I_do

[Bruce the Shark]

Hi, thanks for the reply and link.
I think i have worked out what i was doing wrong.
I had the registration settings set to email activation allowing them to instantly re post over and over again.
I think this is the likely reason as to why.
All i need now to do is remove all the post.
I am up to 2813 post and i hope this stops.

[Bruce the Shark]

Ok back
it appears it isnt working.
I have read the whole page and applied all the settings with no success.
I there a plan B....?

[Bob Perry of Web Presence Consulting]

Ok back
it appears it isnt working.
I have read the whole page and applied all the settings with no success.
I there a plan B....?

Are you relying on that one link for your information? ...you should see what a  simple search term such as "spam" turns up as far as other board owners are doing and posting questions about...

[a10]

1. Set the forum to maintenance mode.
2. Delete all the spam members and posts.
3. Add some good Verification Questions (Security and Moderation > Anti-Spam), search the forum for details about what, which and how.
4. Take the forum out of maintenance mode.

Do some reading about eventual additional antispam methods.

[Bruce the Shark]

1: I am not able to set this into maintenance mode.
It will not allow me to save the setting.

2 I can not delete my messages.

3. I have added a few question to my verification code but its not doing anything.

[Drunken Clam]

The 2 verification questions you have added are pretty much useless! 

Not being funny here but, you have zero legitimate posts and just 9 members, (most of which are spammers!), if I were you, I'd delete the whole forum and start again, ensuring that you set up effective anti spam measures BEFORE releasing it to the public.

My 0.02 cents

[a10]

Questions\answers with Yes \ No and 2+2 are of zero help. Did you search the forum for info about how to set some good questions? Spend some time reading, you will be rewarded. And forget the captcha, bots walk right trough it anyway.

You are admin (or moderator with full admin power) and can't delete posts \ members, nor set maintenance !? Maybe better to post about that problem by making a new topic.

Good luck.

[Bruce the Shark]

I was reading up on the topics on how to delete my post but there is nothing on my forum to allow me to do this simple task.
But what i will do now is to do a full reset of my whole forum from scratch
Originally i did set this to the anti spam to allow all the question to be answered first before posting.
but it seems it just didn't work.
I will try again from scratch.
Thanks for your help

[Kindred]

For verification questions, there is the box used to configure the verification questions. Usually this is the most efficient anti-spam method provided by SMF due to its forum specific nature. There are a few things to note about this method to increase its efficiency:

    Automated registration bots are usually quite good at math, avoid questions like: what's the result of 2+2? and similar.
    International audiences may not understand local slang, or local terminology, ensure that questions do not alienate an otherwise active member base.

Be sure to put in the number of verification questions user must answer under the configure verification methods category ABOVE the verification questions.

You obviously did not actually READ the wiki link...


Also, if you actually HAD applied "all" of the methods discussed there, then we'd be having a very different discussion, since several of the mods listed actually do the same thing and can not be used together... and one of them (firewall) is really only for advanced users...

As for why you can nto put your site in maintenance mode?   Probably because your Settings.php file is not writeable.

[Bruce the Shark]

Ok I caught him.
I got his ip.....188.32.197.241
banned for life plus without parole.
Darn idiot, i don't know what i ever did to him to deserve all of this.
Hes ruined everything for me.

Kindred i will read carefully again your instruction.
Its so hard to concentrate when your panicking.

[Kindred]

well, if you are going to be an admin on the internet, you need to stop that.... because a spammer is hardly a panic-worthy occurrence.

Also, if it's a real spammer, banning the IP won't be anything more than a temporary fix.

finally...  using SMF's ban system is NOT the way to handle spammers... nor is banning by IP. preventing them from registering in the first place is...

[kat]

Another idea... Restrict your new members to posting in just one board. Maybe, an "Introduce yourself" one? Once they've made a few posts, or you're satisfied that they're not Spamtards, you can move them to another membergroup, where they can post in the other boards. That way, all the spammy crap should be in one place, which makes it easier to nuke.

[Bruce the Shark]

Kindred you are correct with your explanation to

"As for why you can to put your site in maintenance mode?   Probably because your Settings.php file is not writeable."

So true i wasn't able to activate this or check the box to apply it.

So in theory is it correct to say, my Red Shadow theme has some very weak flaws and possible best to avoid this in total.
I am disappointed now, as its been a few weeks now that i have been trying to get this to work for me,and now it appears i have lost my theme back ground as well.


I got so much to learn.

[Kindred]

WTF?

No...  the THEME has nothing to do with any of this.

[Bruce the Shark]

Ok well look like i got that one wrong here as well, looks like i  best go back to the drawing board and do some sore scientific research.
Still though this SMF should be changed to CMF ( Complicated Machine Forum )
Just saying
Thanks for all your help.

[Arantor]

SMF isn't complicated. You should see some of the other forum systems out there.