SPAM on this forum - help me understand

[j-bird]

OK - I'm an engineer by trade, but apparently I live under a rock when it comes to this social media stuff. Other than a few forums I am not connected to social media - not facebook, or twitter or any of the other stuff either. When I first heard of someone having a tweet - I thought that was a new term for a shart!

With the recent SPAM activity on here - I fail to see the point. Other than giving us fodder for our childish remarks, what does the poster stand to gain?

Why would someone go to the trouble of becoming a member only to post some gibberish that has absolutely nothing to do with what this forum is about? It would be one thing if we where getting posts of people pushing outdoor products or other outdoor related sites and the like, but meditation and laxatives......really?

The mods have done a great job of responding to the spam - I am just trying to get an understanding of the intent of it.

 

[wiscwhip]

Sometimes(many times) they have viruses or highjack programs piggybacked in the links they post with the thread, notice how they all have a link somewhere in the post.;) No clicky on spam linky, got it! Other times they are just pimping product.

 

[West Branch]

Click on a link and find out! JK... but the clicking on a link may try get some malware or something to download onto your computer. Or bring you to a website where it tried to get someone to log into facebook or something like that so they can hijack that account and spread more links.

I think some of the new "members" posting the spam may be some sort of automated computer, so its some guy sitting in his basement writing programs that go around the internet making new accounts and posting stuff. I think one way some websites prevent that is having a new member do one of those captcha things or something similar? All I know is that someone knows more about that stuff than me.

 

[wiscwhip]

West Branch understands!

 

[kabic]

maybe one of the mods need to change the questions to make it harder for spammers to register

https://xenforo.com/help/captcha/

 

[BJE80]

In addition, alot of those accounts may be "Bots" where no human time was taken setting up the account or posting other than to create the bot.

 

[shawnv]

These are not real people in most instances, but a bot program. Many forums share the same backend code and protocols so a bot program can expose the back door and get in and almost appear as if they are "human" many of the links around going to take you somewhere that can infect your PC with a trojan horse or virus to possibly use your computing power for denial of service attacks or to steal personal information.

 

[j-bird]

Well - I'm not sure I fully understand - but I got the gist of it. They are butt-heads and do NOT use the links in their post. I knew some of you guys would know. The more I learn the more I want to go back under my rock!

 

[BJE80]

Well - I'm not sure I fully understand - but I got the gist of it. They are butt-heads and do NOT use the links in their post. I knew some of you guys would know. The more I learn the more I want to go back under my rock!

Also understand they probably get the same message posted on 1000's of forums. If they get 0.01% of people to click on their links it is still a lot of people.

 

[wiscwhip]

Now, SPAM on your sandwich is a whole nother story!;)​

 

[JackTerp]

Now, SPAM on your sandwich is a whole nother story!;)​

But it is almost as bad. :)

 

[phil@thesidehill]

i've spoken to my IT guys and i told them their new project is to work on a program called the "reverse jam".

its simple.....the user gets spammed...the user knows it is spam and clicks on the spam link to initiate the reverse jam. the reverse jam back tracks and ferrets out the source of the spam and displays a gif on their monitor of the reverse jam user flipping the bird, mooning and otherwise mocking the spam originator. After the gif runs on a 24 hour loop it initiates a dooms day overload that machine and turns it into a pile of molten goo. Seems legit right?

They told me that its not possible....i told them with a little imagination anything is possible...and to get back to work on it ASAP. lol

 

[Turkey Creek]

After the gif runs on a 24 hour loop it initiates a dooms day overload that machine and turns it into a pile of molten goo. Seems legit right?

They told me that its not possible....i told them with a little imagination anything is possible...and to get back to work on it ASAP. lol

Now that sounds like a plan to me!:D:D

 

[Jim Timber]

These linked sites also pay per click advertising which generates revenue via the people paying "adware" (google) and other click-through traffic generators. It can be malicious and it can be nothing more than fishing for clicks. Some are accidental, some curiosity, but either way with enough traffic it turns a profit on the referer's account and so the data bots keep mining away.

 

[j-bird]

SPAM on a sam'ich. I've heard that can be as bad as a virus! To be honest I have never had it. It can't be any worse than sliders from White Castle - I'd call it processed meat, but I'm not really sure that calling it meat would be accurate. I figure it's like hotdogs, and you know what the coons said in The Great Outdoors about hotdogs!

 

[John-W-WI]

Ironically the SPAM we have been receiving here is from real people (mostly in China and India) trying to get people to click on their link for one reason or another.

I have changed the questions required to sign up, I've added more questions, I've made them harder, and on and on. There is no way a bot is getting those answers right.

Xenforo has a plug in that is supposed to score a user as they are signing up. If there are too many "questionable" things about a user, they get locked and held for review. I'll be installing that plug-in as soon as I get a chance.

Thanks for putting up with the losers for now!

Thanks,

-John

 

[phil@thesidehill]

china and india.....hhhhmmmm...imagine that.

A buddy of mine has a small server farm that he runs. he says that all day everyday he has hundreds of unauthorized access attempts from china, russia, and a slew of other less than desirable countries.

 

[tooln]

Now everyone here should understand what spammers are all about. If you learned nothing else DONT CLICK ON THE LINK The mods get a big hand as they have been removing them almost as fast as they show up. If you see them all you have to do is report them and they'll be gone that morning. I've never seen one show up during the day normally it's between 3 & 5 AM CST.

 

[McLovin]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forum_spam

I believe most forums require a certain amount of characters in each post, the bots take text from various articles and mash them up into the nonsense we see. This gets them past the filters and the fact that the post makes no sense keeps them from violating any copyright laws.

 

[j-bird]

Thanks for putting up with the losers for now!

Sorry - that comment just made me smile!

So we now have some sort of exam to become a member......good thing I got in early 'cause I'm not a very smart man!