Please Don't Reply to the Spam
Posted: Sat Jul 27, 2013 7:43 amWhy shouldn't I reply to spam?
Because every account that posts spam clicks that little "Notify me when a reply is posted" toggle at the bottom. As soon as something is posted in it, the spamming begins in earnest. While a lot of spam gets deleted, there's an interesting trend:
When a mod or administrator checks the ISP of a spammer, they may discover that there are thousands of different ISPs, and after a good night's spamming, we might get thirty posts from thirty ISPs. After just ONE thread is replied to, we'll get sixty or so, over half of which are from the same ISP. Guess which one?
If you said "whatever ISP is the same as the one in the thread that was replied to," you are correct. Not only does replying to a spam post or spammed thread increase the workload for the mods and administrators, it consequently rewards you with more spam.
Not to mention, another lucrative market for spammers is the selling of information regarding active websites. See, all this time you probably thought it was just a bunch of losers living in their parents' basements with lots of time on their hands...
Aren't you guys using Captcha?
Yes we are. But it isn't as foolproof as many think.
Why is captcha not as foolproof as I think?
Well, apart from the extremely obvious, it doesn't work against live spammers. Yep, that's what we are getting hit by: live spammers. No, nobody in the west would do this for a living, but in places were three bucks a week will keep a roof over your head, you'd better believe this has become a booming industry: use robots to find forums and shoot links to live people to get past the captcha codes. Subscribe to the threads and turn it back over to the robots who wait patiently for a hit.
You don't even have to speak the same language: "e-mail address" looks pretty much the same in all languages, and simply match the Captcha to the little shapes on your keyboard, and boom-- you're a spamming machine.
What can we do to help?
As the title suggests, don't reply to any thread with spam in it.
Because every account that posts spam clicks that little "Notify me when a reply is posted" toggle at the bottom. As soon as something is posted in it, the spamming begins in earnest. While a lot of spam gets deleted, there's an interesting trend:
When a mod or administrator checks the ISP of a spammer, they may discover that there are thousands of different ISPs, and after a good night's spamming, we might get thirty posts from thirty ISPs. After just ONE thread is replied to, we'll get sixty or so, over half of which are from the same ISP. Guess which one?
If you said "whatever ISP is the same as the one in the thread that was replied to," you are correct. Not only does replying to a spam post or spammed thread increase the workload for the mods and administrators, it consequently rewards you with more spam.
Not to mention, another lucrative market for spammers is the selling of information regarding active websites. See, all this time you probably thought it was just a bunch of losers living in their parents' basements with lots of time on their hands...
Aren't you guys using Captcha?
Yes we are. But it isn't as foolproof as many think.
Why is captcha not as foolproof as I think?
Well, apart from the extremely obvious, it doesn't work against live spammers. Yep, that's what we are getting hit by: live spammers. No, nobody in the west would do this for a living, but in places were three bucks a week will keep a roof over your head, you'd better believe this has become a booming industry: use robots to find forums and shoot links to live people to get past the captcha codes. Subscribe to the threads and turn it back over to the robots who wait patiently for a hit.
You don't even have to speak the same language: "e-mail address" looks pretty much the same in all languages, and simply match the Captcha to the little shapes on your keyboard, and boom-- you're a spamming machine.
What can we do to help?
As the title suggests, don't reply to any thread with spam in it.