New user registrations ONLINE
Posted: Tue Nov 20, 2012 8:22 pm
Unfortunately we are currently being inundated with registrations by spammers. It seems spammers from various parts of the world (mostly Ukraine, China and parts of Eastern Europe) are running some form of automated script which continuously registers new users with the sole purpose of posting adverts in the forums and advertising websites in their profiles. It is going to take some time to fix this and so we will need to disable registrations, block their IP addresses and try enabling registrations again to see if it works.
Further updates will be posted below:
Update 28 Nov 2012
Registrations have been online for over 24 hours without any further issue (following some adjustment of the anti-spam settings). I will continue working on blocking the IP addresses of the spammers. Fingers crossed this is an end to it...
Update 26 Nov 2012
Unfortunately I have had to disable user registrations again. We are still being inundated with spambot user registrations (approx 150 over the past 24 hours). I expect registrations will be down until early December as the work involved in blocking the spammers is time consuming and I have little spare time to fix it over the next week (exams and coursework).
Update 25 Nov 2012
Further to the message posted below last week, user registrations are back online.
Update 20 Nov 2012
Since last Friday, the site has been the victim of some fairly heavy spamming. It seems there is some script being used to mass register user accounts with the sole purpose of advertising the usual pills/furniture/etc rubbish. Over the course of three days we had something like 300 new user registered (all spammers). 99.9% of these spammers appear to located in Ukraine, China, Russia and Belarus.
Given the scale and seriousness of it, I need to do some serious IP address blocking. Normally we just block individual addresses, but this time I need to block whole ranges in order to stem the tide. This will take quite a bit of work as I have to look up the individual addresses to find out the range to block. I then need to input them all into the server's security settings. It's going to take a few days for me to get all of this done. Until then, new user registrations will be disabled.
Apologies for the inconvenience.
Further updates will be posted below:
Update 28 Nov 2012
Registrations have been online for over 24 hours without any further issue (following some adjustment of the anti-spam settings). I will continue working on blocking the IP addresses of the spammers. Fingers crossed this is an end to it...
Update 26 Nov 2012
Unfortunately I have had to disable user registrations again. We are still being inundated with spambot user registrations (approx 150 over the past 24 hours). I expect registrations will be down until early December as the work involved in blocking the spammers is time consuming and I have little spare time to fix it over the next week (exams and coursework).
Update 25 Nov 2012
Further to the message posted below last week, user registrations are back online.
Update 20 Nov 2012
Since last Friday, the site has been the victim of some fairly heavy spamming. It seems there is some script being used to mass register user accounts with the sole purpose of advertising the usual pills/furniture/etc rubbish. Over the course of three days we had something like 300 new user registered (all spammers). 99.9% of these spammers appear to located in Ukraine, China, Russia and Belarus.
Given the scale and seriousness of it, I need to do some serious IP address blocking. Normally we just block individual addresses, but this time I need to block whole ranges in order to stem the tide. This will take quite a bit of work as I have to look up the individual addresses to find out the range to block. I then need to input them all into the server's security settings. It's going to take a few days for me to get all of this done. Until then, new user registrations will be disabled.
Apologies for the inconvenience.
