Spam

I'm curious to know how you guys fight spam? There are various ways, which differ with each forum script, but how do you?

Here's what I do to prevent bots from spamming:
I use the native reCaptcha Human Verification method in vBulletin. I also have installed the modification, "NoSpam!" from vbulletin.org.
This is essentially using two Human Verification methods, since vBulletin only allows you to use one at a time.
It has worked very well in terms of stopping bots from registering.

To prevent spam from appearing on my board, I have set up a promotion where the first two posts of a new member must be approved by a moderator. This way, I don't have to keep my eye out (and go look) for spam, and users don't have to see it or report it.
I have a notice displayed to new members informing them of my 2-post-moderation procedure, so I'm sure that will turn away some human spammers (they know they can't get past it).

 

What spam?

My forum "might" get one or two spammers a month. And for them, I have the one touch spam ban and clean up modification installed.

If you want to "fight" spam, it all starts with stopping spam bots from signing up. That can be done with image verification or ReCapthca. The old style captcha is dead and useless against the new bots.

Stop the bots, and you will stop the spam.

Besides that, having an active forum seems to make human spammers pass you up. On a busy forum, they know that as soon as they post, its going to be reported. But a forum that nobody visits, their post might stay there for a couple of days.

A lot of spammers just want backlinks to build up their keywords and page rank in google.

 

I rarely get automated bots as well; my prevention method has proven to work very well.

The reason I ask is because I know many forum administrators out there have issues dealing with spam.

This isn't entirely true. I see spam posts on vBulletin.com (which is pretty active) and even on Digital Point just about every single day. The spammers know how active those sites are (especially DP) and yet they still make the posts.

The only real way to turn them away would to make all links posted by new members to be rel="nofollow". If you let them know this, they won't even attempt.

Also, what exactly does the "One Touch Spam Cleanup" do that the native "Delete as Spam" feature in vBulletin doesn't?

 

The problem is with "borderline spam", i.e. a new member (obviously human) who would post something informative, but includes in his signature link to his website, then leaves the thread unattended.