Logged in now, saw this....
Ecigssa spam alerts
- Thread starter Quintusson
- Start date
Got the same thing my side with @sagaag215 the only one with comments in each of those threads
And I'm not sure if it is because I logged this thread under 'off topic' but it does not appear on the main forum screen either?
It will only appear in the off topic tab
Same here... Seems to be a hack
Thanks @ivc_mixer , glad you took a screenshot of it
I saw the same thing when I logged in at about 6am
Not to worry, we deleted all those threads as spam and those users (there were actually two of them) have been removed. Our spam module takes care of the rest.
Forum software looks intact to me so it doesn’t appear anything was “hacked”. Just a member that signed up and started posting all the spam.
Will get the technical team to have a look and just check that nothing else was damaged but I don’t think so.
Vape on!
I saw the same thing when I logged in at about 6am
Not to worry, we deleted all those threads as spam and those users (there were actually two of them) have been removed. Our spam module takes care of the rest.
Forum software looks intact to me so it doesn’t appear anything was “hacked”. Just a member that signed up and started posting all the spam.
Will get the technical team to have a look and just check that nothing else was damaged but I don’t think so.
Vape on!
I'll test the security on that sign up form.
EDIT: I had a look at the sign up page, it's not very secure. It's easy for a spambot to mimic a human controller and they are getting programmed better and better to fill these forms automatically. Basically that script for detecting spam is no good. How many spammers have been let through? Quite a few in my opinion.
Basically there is no Captcha and the question there is far too easy to add. Anyone can google that, we have quite a few international members on here (not saying it's a bad thing for them to know). But lets just say here, you have this specific posting rule where one can't post the same thing (due to network issues, having double posts) or some kind of rule where you can't post immediately after you have done a single post. Spambots cannot read Captcha images and will not be able to apply for membership, therefore increasing the number of human applicants and decrease the number of automated ones.
I haven't applied as I don't want to add to the work load of the admins so all good here for the 2nd membership application.
EDIT: I had a look at the sign up page, it's not very secure. It's easy for a spambot to mimic a human controller and they are getting programmed better and better to fill these forms automatically. Basically that script for detecting spam is no good. How many spammers have been let through? Quite a few in my opinion.
Basically there is no Captcha and the question there is far too easy to add. Anyone can google that, we have quite a few international members on here (not saying it's a bad thing for them to know). But lets just say here, you have this specific posting rule where one can't post the same thing (due to network issues, having double posts) or some kind of rule where you can't post immediately after you have done a single post. Spambots cannot read Captcha images and will not be able to apply for membership, therefore increasing the number of human applicants and decrease the number of automated ones.
I haven't applied as I don't want to add to the work load of the admins so all good here for the 2nd membership application.
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It took me a while to log in. Everytime the home page opened it was in a different layout.
Could this be part of it.
Could this be part of it.
Either or, but preferably both @CTRiaan
We do have quite a secure forum the technical guys assure me
But it does help us if everyone’s eyes and ears are open to looking out for strange posts or behaviour
Just make a thread in Off topic like this one or in Forum Issues and tag admins
It all helps
Thanks for your feedback @RainstormZA
We will look into it
I appreciate your suggestions on the Captcha or to find a mechanism that ensures it’s a human signing up and not a spambot
We nuke spammers once in a while and we have the tools to do it quite well - but today’s event I haven’t seen before. Wow, this spammer made an epic number of posts in a short time.
Maybe today’s spammer had a 21700 battery powering its algorithms. Lol.
We will look into it
I appreciate your suggestions on the Captcha or to find a mechanism that ensures it’s a human signing up and not a spambot
We nuke spammers once in a while and we have the tools to do it quite well - but today’s event I haven’t seen before. Wow, this spammer made an epic number of posts in a short time.
Maybe today’s spammer had a 21700 battery powering its algorithms. Lol.
Thanks @ivc_mixer , glad you took a screenshot of it
I saw the same thing when I logged in at about 6am
Not to worry, we deleted all those threads as spam and those users (there were actually two of them) have been removed. Our spam module takes care of the rest.
Forum software looks intact to me so it doesn’t appear anything was “hacked”. Just a member that signed up and started posting all the spam.
Will get the technical team to have a look and just check that nothing else was damaged but I don’t think so.
Vape on!
Did you check their IP's @Silver? Are they locals or over the waters? I could get someone to visit them.......hehehehe
Almost impossible to trace if they are using proxy servers. So the IP's (if they are on a proxy) will show them in another location when they are actually in another country. I've traced several spammers (using proxies off their ISP) to other countries when they claimed to be local. Made me laugh at how stupid they can be at times, trying to scam people out of their hard earned cash for nothing.Did you check their IP's @Silver? Are they locals or over the waters? I could get someone to visit them.......hehehehe
I had my skype account hacked a few years back and I was so peeved off with the Skype administrators because they wouldn't give me my account back. So I back-tracked this hacker and it turns out it was a lightie from the Netherlands hacking people's accounts for the fun of it. It all points to his behavioral profile that an immature person would do this thinking he would get away with it, trying to make a name for himself. I hope the stupid sod got arrested because apparently after this incident, Skype beefed up their security and deleted a lot of the hacked accounts off their servers. I only found out about it 2 years later because I needed an account and decided to try my luck, to find I could actually start over on a clean slate this time. And I don't know if he's around, I've never bothered to check it out.
All cleaned up
Looks like spambots
We will have to look into the signup process and beefing things up
Thanks guys
All cleaned up
We changed the signup process a few days ago to include that captcha function as was suggested by @RainstormZA
It seems these chaps got through that
Maybe they not bots
But what puzzles us is why would they post gibberish like they do?
I could understand if they were posting adverts to their businesses etc to get some mileage out of it but it seems it’s just nonsense. Well to us on here it seems that way.
Will have to escalate to our higher technical team in the UK I guess. (Xenforo experts who have helped us previously)
Or we might be able to do some magic with the IP number blocking. But that can be a bit of a double edged sword.
Thanks for the alerts and please keep them coming if you see anything strange. We are aware of this and are working on it.
All cleaned up
We changed the signup process a few days ago to include that captcha function as was suggested by @RainstormZA
It seems these chaps got through that
Maybe they not bots
But what puzzles us is why would they post gibberish like they do?
I could understand if they were posting adverts to their businesses etc to get some mileage out of it but it seems it’s just nonsense. Well to us on here it seems that way.
Will have to escalate to our higher technical team in the UK I guess. (Xenforo experts who have helped us previously)
Or we might be able to do some magic with the IP number blocking. But that can be a bit of a double edged sword.
Thanks for the alerts and please keep them coming if you see anything strange. We are aware of this and are working on it.
Hi Silver
Please pm me with their IP address and relevant info- I’ll have a look and report back.
Sometimes I do think like a criminal on how they operate. I find that bots can’t sign up but maybe it’s manually signed up and let loose once they are in.
And maybe from last time something is lingering on the system like a modified code from the last spam spree. It can be anything.
Unfortunately as it is with my experience with mail spam, they change email addresses so often but operate from the same IP address. But much harder if it’s operated on a proxy.
Please pm me with their IP address and relevant info- I’ll have a look and report back.
Sometimes I do think like a criminal on how they operate. I find that bots can’t sign up but maybe it’s manually signed up and let loose once they are in.
And maybe from last time something is lingering on the system like a modified code from the last spam spree. It can be anything.
Unfortunately as it is with my experience with mail spam, they change email addresses so often but operate from the same IP address. But much harder if it’s operated on a proxy.
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