Removal of Spam threads.

Originally Posted by Emerson I wouldn't rule out this site is compromised.

The site was not compromised in any way.

--jeremy

Cleanup is almost completed now. I apologize for the inconvenience. If any legitimate accounts were banned or legitimate posts removed, please let me know.

--jeremy

Good job and well done.

Well done guys!

Thanks for all the hard work admin people.

I watched this develop overnight - it was well orchestrated IMO.

There was a definite not-so-subtle signature in most, but not all that I saw early on which I do not want to post visibly here, but use your shell/sed skills on this...

"ZEV.bvg.AlexmW88aRYH91<<0>>-<<X>>JDL(o)T-88HGICleon.Myzik"
s/[^__@0-7PFW:MC;RaBOt=dQ__-]\+//Ig

From the initial development speed and thread posting pattern I thought it was human, but the later rate made me think bot or multiple humans.

And yes, thanks to the admins... I know the feeling...

It started again ...

It simply is not possible to win the spam wars with an open forum policy.

I do not know the best way for LQ to handle it, but it will get worse - there are a near infinite number of low-grade morons armed with a potentially infinite number of bots, out there. Ultimately you just have to make it inaccessible to them.

And it is a fair bet that more than a few of the sorry b***ards learn their limited skills form LQ...

Is it from North Korea? Did someone of us insult Kim?

Originally Posted by Emerson Is it from North Korea? Did someone of us insult Kim?

I tend to think it is more likely to be iitiated by some self-important western entity such as an offended rights-horader or authority who feels threatened by free exchange of information and the concept of shared human knowledge. They have the access and the resources... the diaper wearing imbeciles who are then manipulated to participate are clueless but don't care about the motivation... they just think it is kewl to beat civilized man into the dirt for fun and profit, or for no reason at all...

I think jeremy needs to change the registration process. For example, yahoo sends a code to the mobile phone to verify yourself.

Also, the admin for the pclinuxos.com forum disabled the usual registration process. In order to have an account in the pclinuxos.com's forum, you'll have to send the admin an email with the desired username and password. Then the admin sends an email to notify the user the account is now active and to change the password.

That would leave me out - I have no mobile...

I think it needs more than a tighter signup process though. There must be some madatory, dead end, moderation process for new members - something effective that they simply cannot bypass.

Obviously that means the end of the truly open forum model, but I think that is where we are as a global society at this time, in more ways than internet access controls. The game as we have tried to play it is simply over.

Until the nature of man can be changed, we need a better model.

One option that wouldn't eliminate it, but would at least slow it down (and would also slow down some legitimate users who NEED slowing down), is to implement a limit of one new thread per day per user.

Originally Posted by TobiSGD Only root can do that, so until Jeremy is aware of the situation all I can do is to slow them down, swinging the banhammer wildly.

I bet swinging the hammer could become recursive. If it hasn't already.
If I could help you I would.-

Do you foresee Jeremy restricting the registration process?

Originally Posted by astrogeek That would leave me out - I have no mobile... I think it needs more than a tighter signup process though. There must be some madatory, dead end, moderation process for new members - something effective that they simply cannot bypass. Obviously that means the end of the truly open forum model, but I think that is where we are as a global society at this time, in more ways than internet access controls. The game as we have tried to play it is simply over. Until the nature of man can be changed, we need a better model.

Agreed-
In other Linux forums when a new member registers you have to wait for a Moderator or and Administrator to approve the new membership.