(Archived) Forum "Private Messages" temporarily disabled

[engberg 89]

I've had two reports today from users who say that they've been receiving junk spam in the form of Private Messages from this forum.

I don't see any easy way to filter spam from non-spam, so I've disabled the "Private Message" feature on the forums until we can figure out a better solution.

I apologize for the inconvenience.

[Fireproof 0]

I've had two reports today from users who say that they've been receiving junk spam in the form of Private Messages from this forum.

I don't see any easy way to filter spam from non-spam, so I've disabled the "Private Message" feature on the forums until we can figure out a better solution.

I apologize for the inconvenience.

I run a fitness forum and had to deal with this issue. Most of the time, these are hit and run spammers who never take time to post on the forums.

So I simply required a minimum of 10 posts before a user account was allowed to send a PM.

Occasionally the spammers would then try to create 10 bogus posts to do that, but that gave us enough time for the Mods to catch them and ban them.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[spg SCOTT 736]

I think that idea is good, just that 10 is not enough...I have seen spammers with more than 10 posts before they have been cleaned up before...

Another forum I know, is set at 20, which may not even be enough here.

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

I suspect that's why there are occasionally the "hi, I'm new to the forum" posts or the occasional post quoting a previous post but nothing new is added. For that reason, those posts get deleted.

I don't know if spam software allows people to make the required number of posts, but I'd guess if it doesn't, it will soon. So for me, it's fine to delete those meaningless, OT posts by new/unknown posters.

[Fireproof 0]

I think that idea is good, just that 10 is not enough...I have seen spammers with more than 10 posts before they have been cleaned up before...

Another forum I know, is set at 20, which may not even be enough here.

True. To me, Private Messaging is a privilege, so I don't think it would be a big deal to make the minimum 25 or 50 if they wanted to do that. I have some pretty good mods that are "ever present" it seems, so our spammers never get up to 10 without being stifled.

[engberg 89]

Ok, I've re-enabled PMs with some security countermeasures enabled. Let me know if you get any more spam PMs.