A note on new spambots
Tresset
Member, Moderator Posts: 8,268
As with most all forums out there, we have our fair share of problems with spambots, which are basically automated programs that roam the internet and try to insert spam into every corner of it. The other moderators and I do our best to fight these bots, but some inevitably get through the cracks every once in a while and manage to put spam in the forums. When they do manage to get through we usually just ban them and delete all the content they have posted.
There is a new type of spambot that has been bothering us lately. These bots are more cunning than others, and instead of simply spamming, they first copy/paste an on-topic discussion from another website, such as Reddit, or even our own forums, and then come back several days later and edit the post to contain spam. Because they copy/paste on-topic discussions, many actual users think they are real and respond to them. The moderation team has decided that, since these topics are (usually) relevant discussions on this forum, we will not delete them if they get responses. Instead we will simply ban the spambot, remove the spam from their post, and add a note on that post that it is a spambot and not a real user.
Some examples:
There is a new type of spambot that has been bothering us lately. These bots are more cunning than others, and instead of simply spamming, they first copy/paste an on-topic discussion from another website, such as Reddit, or even our own forums, and then come back several days later and edit the post to contain spam. Because they copy/paste on-topic discussions, many actual users think they are real and respond to them. The moderation team has decided that, since these topics are (usually) relevant discussions on this forum, we will not delete them if they get responses. Instead we will simply ban the spambot, remove the spam from their post, and add a note on that post that it is a spambot and not a real user.
Some examples:
This spam was copied from this website.
This spam was copied from this website.
This spam was copied from this website.
Post edited by Tresset on
19
Comments
The examples linked above are indeed spambots, and NOT real people. They are fake accounts crated by automated programming. They are bots. They looked real at first, but this is only because they copied what an actual person said on another website and then pasted it here. Then, several days after the initial post, The bots came back and edited their posts to include spam links and ads.
The accounts were banned because they are not real people. They are spambots. A spambot is like a computer virus. It tries to insert itself into forums to either spam with advertisements, or simply spam to be malicious. If we did not ban these spambots, they would continue to spam and confuse people with their fake posts.
In the examples above I edited the posts to remove the spam links from them. I also added notes to inform people that the accounts were not real people and were just malicious programming that got past our filters. I removed the spam links because we DO NOT allow advertising or spam on our forum and especially because we DO NOT want to support these malicious spambots in any way, shape, or form by allowing them to successfully insert their spam into our forum. Therefore you will not see any spam in the linked posts at all.
These steps are all necessary to ensure that our forums remain pleasant, spam free, and even to ensure the safety of our users. I will now add to the examples above the source of the text that the spambots copied from in each case.