User Guidance: How to identify and react to spam

btarunr · Apr 21, 2009, 10:22 AM

TPU is a big and popular community. Where there are 1000s of users from all over the world, 100s active at any given time, there's always an open invitation for spammers to spread spam here.

While we are adequately equipped with moderators spread across different time-zones, have a "one-click" method of destroying spam and deleting spam accounts, a good deal of this work relies on users reporting suspicious posts. Reporting posts is a guaranteed way of alerting the staff of something going wrong, spam being one of them. There have been several instances where users instead of reporting suspicious posts, quoted, and replied to spam. This is not what you should be doing. While any moderator can delete spam from anywhere in the forums, not all moderators can delete posts from users everywhere. Hence even while the spam is gone, the contents of the spam post(s) are probably quoted by a user a moderator cannot edit/delete. Here is a small guidance:

Identifying Spam:

Here's what a typical spam post should look like:

1. A username that makes perfect spam sense, sometimes the username has a random number or special characters
2. Signature space has suspicious links
3. The obvious links in the post's body

Sometimes the spammer starts off with something seemingly useless, with the post body saying nothing more than "very useful post, thanks a lot!" and the signature having a/some suspicious link(s), even this qualifies as spam.

Reacting to Spam:

Do not quote or reply to the spam in any way. It makes things difficult to clean up threads.

Report the post. Click on the

button for the spam post, just type in "spam" in the text box, and submit the report. Any active moderator will follow up with the report and delete the spam. Again, reporting posts is the best way of alerting the entire mod staff of something wrong, you would rather not send PMs or visitor messages to specific moderators, when you have the easier way of doing it.

tzitzibp · Apr 21, 2009, 11:13 AM

we try our best!
The last thing we all need is a site full of spam....

Mussels · Apr 21, 2009, 11:19 AM

this needs to be stickied. It gets tiresome cleaning up after people start quoting the spam post... even if we ban the spammer, his posts live on in quotes.

mlee49 · Apr 22, 2009, 06:59 PM

I actually read this thread earlier and it seriously helped with the spam I just reported.

I thought earlier that the I hadn't seen any spam in a while, guess it was all timing.

Polaris573 · Apr 22, 2009, 07:42 PM

Good idea and nice work Btarunr.

tzitzibp · Apr 22, 2009, 08:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mussels

this needs to be stickied. It gets tiresome cleaning up after people start quoting the spam post... even if we ban the spammer, his posts live on in quotes.

I agree... this should be stickied!

Fitseries3 · Apr 22, 2009, 08:15 PM

the report post button is also the formal way to tell the mods/admins if someone is provoking an argument, "flaming", name calling, or any situation which needs to be intercepted by a higher power.

Triprift · May 13, 2009, 08:16 AM

Excellent post particularly with the identifying spam as some are easier to pick as spam than others.

May 13, 2009, 08:18 AM

Spot on guide for newer members. If in doubt, always ask a mod or someone in higher power!

Mussels · May 13, 2009, 11:44 AM

oh rofl, BTA just deleted a spam post from this thread!

btarunr · May 13, 2009, 11:45 AM

Around ~30 seconds after it was posted.

Mussels · May 13, 2009, 11:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by btarunr

Around ~30 seconds after it was posted.

and 10 seconds before i came into this thread. it always amases me how you and sneeky can find and delete spam before i even get the email alerts telling me the threads got a new post.

denice25 · May 13, 2009, 11:47 AM

nice share! thanks...

btarunr · May 13, 2009, 11:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mussels

and 10 seconds before i came into this thread. it always amases me how you and sneeky can find and delete spam before i even get the email alerts telling me the threads got a new post.

The aliens upgraded our anti-spam reflexes. I'd asked for better reflexes on the road though. Life is unfair.

Steevo · May 13, 2009, 02:37 PM

fried spam sarnie on toast with mustard please

mlee49 · Nov 26, 2010, 01:00 PM

Bump, looks like we've been spammed again.

slyfox2151 · Nov 26, 2010, 01:32 PM

Mods seem to be AFK

... longest spam post iv ever seen on TPU... usualy there gone within 90 seconds. this one is still here 15 mins later.

dr emulator (madmax) · Nov 26, 2010, 01:46 PM

i sent bta and mussels an email maybe he and everyone else is busy

Mussels · Nov 27, 2010, 12:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dr emulator (madmax)

i sent bta and mussels an email maybe he and everyone else is busy

yeah but your email linked to nothing lol.

Polaris573 · Nov 27, 2010, 01:57 AM

Don't e-mail us for spam. Just use the report post button and someone will get to it eventually.

We get e-mail alerts when you report a post. If we're busy we're busy a 15 minute spam thread isn't the end of the world.

Steevo · Nov 27, 2010, 05:01 AM

I just want to say if a post includes good looking female breasts it won't get reported by me.

dr emulator (madmax) · Nov 27, 2010, 10:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mussels

yeah but your email linked to nothing lol.

that's probably because said person was gone before you read it

never mind it just bugged me that no one was around, but that's how it is sometimes, doubt it'll happen again

Quote:

Originally Posted by Polaris573

Don't e-mail us for spam. Just use the report post button and someone will get to it eventually.

We get e-mail alerts when you report a post. If we're busy we're busy a 15 minute spam thread isn't the end of the world.

i do talk to you guys outside of tpu (sometimes, well maybe not you polaris

)

micropage7 · Dec 4, 2010, 10:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by btarunr

Life is unfair.

thats why we gonna have judgment day

Polaris573 · Dec 4, 2010, 04:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dr emulator (madmax)

i do talk to you guys outside of tpu (sometimes, well maybe not you polaris

)

That's different. You know what I mean.

VeniceH · Sep 15, 2011, 03:44 AM

Hello there people! I am also very sensitive to spammers. I will cooperate to slash them out from our community.

Apr 21, 2009, 10:22 AM	#1
btarunr Editor & Senior Moderator Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Hyderabad, India Posts: 14,982 (7.30/day) Thanks: 788 Thanked 12,899 Times in 5,650 Posts System Specs	User Guidance: How to identify and react to spam TPU is a big and popular community. Where there are 1000s of users from all over the world, 100s active at any given time, there's always an open invitation for spammers to spread spam here. While we are adequately equipped with moderators spread across different time-zones, have a "one-click" method of destroying spam and deleting spam accounts, a good deal of this work relies on users reporting suspicious posts. Reporting posts is a guaranteed way of alerting the staff of something going wrong, spam being one of them. There have been several instances where users instead of reporting suspicious posts, quoted, and replied to spam. This is not what you should be doing. While any moderator can delete spam from anywhere in the forums, not all moderators can delete posts from users everywhere. Hence even while the spam is gone, the contents of the spam post(s) are probably quoted by a user a moderator cannot edit/delete. Here is a small guidance: Identifying Spam: Here's what a typical spam post should look like: 1. A username that makes perfect spam sense, sometimes the username has a random number or special characters 2. Signature space has suspicious links 3. The obvious links in the post's body Sometimes the spammer starts off with something seemingly useless, with the post body saying nothing more than "very useful post, thanks a lot!" and the signature having a/some suspicious link(s), even this qualifies as spam. Reacting to Spam: Do not quote or reply to the spam in any way. It makes things difficult to clean up threads. Report the post. Click on the button for the spam post, just type in "spam" in the text box, and submit the report. Any active moderator will follow up with the report and delete the spam. Again, reporting posts is the best way of alerting the entire mod staff of something wrong, you would rather not send PMs or visitor messages to specific moderators, when you have the easier way of doing it.

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Apr 21, 2009, 11:13 AM	#2
tzitzibp Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: Larisa, Greece Posts: 1,689 (0.84/day) Thanks: 330 Thanked 329 Times in 321 Posts System Specs	we try our best! The last thing we all need is a site full of spam.... __________________ People who think that know it all are just annoying to us who do! *(Updated) My WOODEN CASE BUILD... vote and comment here:* StarCruiser Dark Knight

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Apr 21, 2009, 11:19 AM	#3
Mussels Doctor Moderator Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: Bendigo, Australia (NOT THE USA) Posts: 34,553 (10.97/day) Thanks: 3,699 Thanked 8,689 Times in 6,389 Posts System Specs	this needs to be stickied. It gets tiresome cleaning up after people start quoting the spam post... even if we ban the spammer, his posts live on in quotes. __________________ Edumacational thread about PC Audio My external HDD's.5x samsung 1TB + 2x Seagate 1.5TB = 8 TB external storage 32 Bit OS vs 64 bit OS information How to get hardware accelerated H264 playback (DXVA) Netbook Owners United!

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Apr 22, 2009, 06:59 PM	#4
mlee49 Eligible for custom title Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: KU Posts: 6,921 (3.51/day) Thanks: 1,598 Thanked 2,047 Times in 1,602 Posts System Specs	I actually read this thread earlier and it seriously helped with the spam I just reported. I thought earlier that the I hadn't seen any spam in a while, guess it was all timing. __________________ Heatware: Mlee49 115-0

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Apr 22, 2009, 07:42 PM	#5
Polaris573 Senior Moderator Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Little Rock, USA Posts: 3,284 (1.09/day) Thanks: 68 Thanked 765 Times in 451 Posts System Specs	Good idea and nice work Btarunr. __________________ Lector benevole, legum servi sumus ut liberi esse possimus. Accipere quam facere praestat injuriam Fold for Techpowerup!

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Apr 22, 2009, 08:15 PM	#7
Fitseries3 Eleet Hardware Junkie Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Republic of Texas Posts: 14,993 (7.30/day) Thanks: 4,318 Thanked 3,285 Times in 2,186 Posts System Specs	the report post button is also the formal way to tell the mods/admins if someone is provoking an argument, "flaming", name calling, or any situation which needs to be intercepted by a higher power.

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May 13, 2009, 08:16 AM	#8
Triprift Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: Adelaide Australia Posts: 4,258 (2.14/day) Thanks: 520 Thanked 946 Times in 787 Posts System Specs	Excellent post particularly with the identifying spam as some are easier to pick as spam than others. __________________ Welcome to the lost chicken helpline if you have lost your chicken press 1, if you have found a lost chicken press 2, if you would like to adopt a chicken press 3, if you would like to sponsor a chicken press 4 for all other enquiries press 5 Graphic Artists United™ Solaris utility DVD 4.0 ---General nonsense 2.0--- How to post pics at TPU

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May 13, 2009, 08:18 AM	#9
kyle2020 Guest Posts: n/a (0/day)	Spot on guide for newer members. If in doubt, always ask a mod or someone in higher power!

May 13, 2009, 11:44 AM	#10
Mussels Doctor Moderator Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: Bendigo, Australia (NOT THE USA) Posts: 34,553 (10.97/day) Thanks: 3,699 Thanked 8,689 Times in 6,389 Posts System Specs	oh rofl, BTA just deleted a spam post from this thread! __________________ Edumacational thread about PC Audio My external HDD's.5x samsung 1TB + 2x Seagate 1.5TB = 8 TB external storage 32 Bit OS vs 64 bit OS information How to get hardware accelerated H264 playback (DXVA) Netbook Owners United!

May 13, 2009, 11:45 AM	#11
btarunr Editor & Senior Moderator Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Hyderabad, India Posts: 14,982 (7.30/day) Thanks: 788 Thanked 12,899 Times in 5,650 Posts System Specs	Around ~30 seconds after it was posted. __________________ Gadgets, Phones, Tablets, Cameras, TVs, HiFi...NextPowerUp

May 13, 2009, 11:47 AM	#13
denice25 Join Date: Feb 2009 Posts: 202 (0.13/day) Thanks: 2 Thanked 17 Times in 17 Posts	nice share! thanks...

May 13, 2009, 02:37 PM	#15
Steevo Eligible for custom title Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 5,567 (2.02/day) Thanks: 238 Thanked 979 Times in 729 Posts System Specs	fried spam sarnie on toast with mustard please __________________ “it would have been perfect....its got trains and the line"tech your kids not to do what iv done"(or similar) because i had obviously done something to warrent 2 e-thugs to come 4000miles out of their way and kill me.” -Solaris17 “yeah i failed. i noticed the "coming soon" part after i posted.” -Mussels “people are just stupid.” -W1zzard Yes I am evil, yes you can have some.

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Nov 26, 2010, 01:00 PM	#16
mlee49 Eligible for custom title Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: KU Posts: 6,921 (3.51/day) Thanks: 1,598 Thanked 2,047 Times in 1,602 Posts System Specs	Bump, looks like we've been spammed again. __________________ Heatware: Mlee49 115-0

Nov 26, 2010, 01:32 PM	#17
slyfox2151 Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Brisbane, Australia Posts: 2,515 (1.58/day) Thanks: 57 Thanked 528 Times in 470 Posts System Specs	Mods seem to be AFK ... longest spam post iv ever seen on TPU... usualy there gone within 90 seconds. this one is still here 15 mins later. __________________ “it's still EA.. they will F* it up. F*ing up games is the only thing they do consistently.” -TRIPTEX_MTL

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Nov 26, 2010, 01:46 PM	#18
dr emulator (madmax) Join Date: May 2009 Location: the uk that's all you need to know ;) Posts: 1,107 (0.75/day) Thanks: 757 Thanked 181 Times in 169 Posts System Specs	i sent bta and mussels an email maybe he and everyone else is busy __________________ advice on what type of memory that's needed for the GIGABYTE X58A-UD7 Thanks to stefanels for the signature post pics of your bizaare mods - GPU-Z v0.6.6 is out

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Nov 27, 2010, 01:57 AM	#20
Polaris573 Senior Moderator Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Little Rock, USA Posts: 3,284 (1.09/day) Thanks: 68 Thanked 765 Times in 451 Posts System Specs	Don't e-mail us for spam. Just use the report post button and someone will get to it eventually. We get e-mail alerts when you report a post. If we're busy we're busy a 15 minute spam thread isn't the end of the world. __________________ Lector benevole, legum servi sumus ut liberi esse possimus. Accipere quam facere praestat injuriam Fold for Techpowerup!

Nov 27, 2010, 05:01 AM	#21
Steevo Eligible for custom title Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 5,567 (2.02/day) Thanks: 238 Thanked 979 Times in 729 Posts System Specs	I just want to say if a post includes good looking female breasts it won't get reported by me. __________________ “it would have been perfect....its got trains and the line"tech your kids not to do what iv done"(or similar) because i had obviously done something to warrent 2 e-thugs to come 4000miles out of their way and kill me.” -Solaris17 “yeah i failed. i noticed the "coming soon" part after i posted.” -Mussels “people are just stupid.” -W1zzard Yes I am evil, yes you can have some.

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Sep 15, 2011, 03:44 AM	#25
VeniceH Join Date: Sep 2011 Location: Los Angeles, California Posts: 3 (0.00/day) Thanks: 0 Thanked 1 Time in 1 Post	Hello there people! I am also very sensitive to spammers. I will cooperate to slash them out from our community.

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