Messageboard Spam

[Deadlyne]

Forum URL: burningbrides.proboards28.com

Hello,

I was wondering if there is any way to ban a guest from my board permanently, because they keep spamming the board. They use a random screen name, something like "QUioewstskdf" and then create a thread with random links to god only knows what. Anyway, I tried making the boards to where guests must log in, but then my members got upset that they had to log in every time, and while that did stop the spamming for about a week, I took it back off guests must log in, and almost instantly the spammer was back. I'm just wondering if there is any other way to stop them that I have yet to think of.

Jess

[california]

Ban their IP address (which you can get from their posts).

[Deadlyne]

Yes yes, I've done that, its a dialup ip address, so its rather ineffective.

[california]

Then I'm afraid there's really nothing you can do but disable guest posting.

[north]

Hi ~

I'm a GM on pnpartners.proboards32.com. My Board Administrator is unable to be online due to health problems, and I have limited capabilities in the admin department.

We've had the same problem with the alphabet soup character. I just deleted the 3rd message he/she posted in the last couple of weeks. I didn't get the IP number from the first one, have them from the last 2 (posted on 11/26 and 12/01).

They're different numbers, but same info comes up when they're plugged into WHOIS:

OrgName: Asia Pacific Network Information Centre
OrgID: APNIC
Address: PO Box 2131
City: Milton
StateProv: QLD
PostalCode: 4064
Country: AU

I don't know enough about tracing to go beyond that - nor do I know what to do about this character, other than delete the posts as soon as I can.

That's not the only issue he/she has created, however. One of our members reported this:

I wanted to respond to this Weird "letters" or Crazy writings. I went to my mailbox a few minutes ago,I had a message from this person.the screen name was the same ,With An exception,The letters were Not In the same sequence,The Topic was,"Just checking In". I wanted so much to open it ,But I clicked for it to go into " Report Spam mail."

So it seems that not only is he/she posting on the board, but apparently has emailed one of our members. This is not good at all. Should I advise our members to hide their email addresses until we can get this resolved somehow?

Any suggestions, instructions or ideas would sure be appreciated!

Thanks for any and all help ~

[[K]hAoS]

If you are having problems with a member then ban them, you can click on there profile to view their IP address. Like you said, it would also be advisable to tell your members to hide there email address's.

[Omar]

yes u can ban ips.
u can disable accounts.
but they can register then.
so the best thing is ban they ip adress

[north]

Thanks for the information and suggestions. I will tell our members to hide their email addresses.

I wasn't clear about the alphabet soup poster - he/she is not a member, but comes in as a guest. The IP changes from message to message, so there's no real way to ban him/her, is there?

Sorry if there's an obvious issue or answer I'm missing; this is a learning experience for me.

Thanks once again for your help.