I just wanted to let the forum know that I just got a lovely Christmas treat from a user by the name of "Viphoto" who thought it was cool to post links to underage porn sites and other silly spam.

As a Christmas gift to this loser, I banned their account and deleted the post from record.

On behalf of anyone who happened to view the post before I could get around to deleting it, I apologize for this material being posted on our boards. I am always appalled at the lack of intelligence of some people.

I quite believe that was a bot and not a person ... but still ... bots aren't just made from computer dust ... SOMEONE has designed it.

Lame.

Thanks to 420 for deleting the offensive post. :yes:

I cannot believe some people. :no:

It seems that many other regions have been afflicted with this sort of impersonal spamming before. Very irritating.

I hope you also reported it to the proper authorities. I am pretty darned liberal when it comes to consenting adults but that crosses the line for sure!

But of course, fine Sir!

Tis actually what took me half an hour to delete the post, much to Ess's chagrin last night (possible the only other person that actually saw the post). Wanted to get a screen cap of it and contact the proper people before getting rid of the evidence.

If I was chagrined, it was at the idiot who posted that b.s.
When I first came onto the forums, it was just me and Blackshear. I saw the title of the post, clicked on it, saw all the links and then looked at who was here again and it was now me and 420. I pm'd 420 and almost immediately he pm'd me back and next I looked the offensive post was gone. Couldn't have been 1/2 hour - more like 10 minutes or less.

Good work, 420! :yes:

*edit*

Another bot, or whatever is back with another post. I see 420 is here, so I'm sure it'll be gone soon! :yes:

MY god some people are sick in this world!

But by the sounds of thing 420 handled it extremely well, That's just another sign that 420 is awesome!

Yup - thanks for the PM on that one Ess.

User: Vipotto was banned for posting offending material.

Users: PPlayer and Bidder1972 have also been banned as a precaution as their email addresses were all VERY similar and are too close for co-incidence for me.

I will not say why or how, but I believe I have nipped this one in the butt and we won't have these kind of posts anymore.

Excellent work, now for the reward:
:420:

Thanks 420; I saw the post as well, but before I could PM someone, it was gone -- you done a good, quick job!

I was on very early yesterday and reported that one as soon as I saw it. (Using report button).

I don't know what that button actually does but I pushed it anyway.

The report button sends an email to the moderator(s) of the forum wherein the offense occured.

It *might* also get sent to admins ... I can't remember. I got the email - thank you for sending it.

Your right 420. The forum Moderator and each Admin recieves an Email and link to the post (and with the offending posters profile name in certain instances) :).

(I haven't. Hmmm...)


This is a pretty pityful act from someone who hasn't and shan't ever have a place in our community.

Have you changed you Email account? That's the only reason I can think of.

I did, but about a year ago.

Check yourself in the CP admin Omni ... there is no email address attached to your account, thus the computer has no clue where to send email to you.

Either rectify it yourself or I can do it for you.

Three more users were banned for the same reason as above ... no posts were made, however the email address and other identifying information was too similar to the previously banned accounts for coincidence.

I'm starting to enjoy this ... so whomever it is that is actually spending the time to enter in the security information to create new accounts, please ... continue. I'm having fun and you are providing me with much entertainment.

Yup ... that's right ... it isn't a bot. Unless someone has made a really sophisticated bot that knows how to enter in security codes when registering (security codes are those six to ten character codes that they make you type in to prove you aren't a bot).

I have noticed this kind of intrusion in several other forums that I use, I wonder if people are paid to do this kind of thing or if they are simply so bored and lame that this is how they entertain themselves. Kind of sad really...

Not to pry to much... what is the average age of users in this forum? I don't know if that can be worked out, but could make for an interesting statistic.

I'd love to be able to find a job that pays me to post spam on message boards. Anyone got any hook ups for me?

As for the other ... I don't know ... and I don't see how it has anything to do with this issue ... however ... in my current unlow state .... I really like elipses.

Also, my guess is 42. Just 'cause that's the answer to everything.

Well if it's not a bot than it's human.

I suppose these shenanigans make good banning practice.

Ah yes, of course it has no relevence to the issue. It was just a question of course. I like the description of maintaining an unlow state. That's interesting.

Keep pushing that red button :P

(I'd have said the average age was 23, mainly as that's a good age to be at)

The only way to create a bot to do this would be to enable it to 'read' the page or any imbedded links or third-party hosted linked images. That is, read outsourced images or be sensitive to characters.

The reason security codes have lines through them is to confuse simple bots that can do this. Some security boxes also scramble the link to the image so that the bot cannot track it to the source.

I think it may be a human registering, but a bot then accessing the account (the code is incomplete) which means it's either a spamming bot unable to use the board code (which I will not name) or someone who has only a basic grasp of .html.

I was using my free time at work today (sorry JT :blush::P ) to do a bit of research on this issue and it appears that there are any number of bots available out there which can 'read' validation codes and images. For example there's a spambot available here for the bargain price of $450 US which advertises itself as being able to work with lots of different types of forums and guestbooks including phpBB and PHP-Nuke with any modifications, yaBB, VBulletin, Invision Power Board, IconBoard, UltimateBB, exBB, phorum.org, wiki, different types of bulletin boards and even custom-written code. It also promises to 'work around EVERY possible type of protection from automatic registration, including:
- Pictocode protection (tickets, captcha), which look something like: "Enter the number you see in the box", E-mail activation protection, and Java-script detection'.
It doesn't mention 4_20 protection though, so I'm guessing we're pretty safe. ;)

I also came across a quote from an Invisonfree admin who advised forum admins:

This is a fascinating subject. Scary, but fascinating.

Heh! If I wasn't suspicious you'd like it, I'd give you a good spanking for messing up your priorities. :rofl:

Wait a sec .... free time at work? Why can't I ever find those kind of jobs?

aka The Half Hour Lunch Break. :rolleyes:

Ohhhhhhhhhh .... yeah ... i get an hour ... but there is no free time involved in that ... 15 minutes is for eating and 45 for sleeping.

Two more to the list.

Fun times :)