Would I get banned from SMF Community if I removed the SMF copyright from my forum? I have had some serious spamage and the only thing that really helps is to remove the copyright. I've installed several mods that are a pain to set-up properly with little to no effect against the spam.
So I have dropped six of my websites running on SMF and converted them to blogger. I still have 2 sites that still run on SMF, simply because no other software can give me what I need except for SMF 2.0.x. I'm not saying it's SMF fault that I get all the spam, it's just the way it is. I learned that spam-bots scan sites with the SMF copyright, then submit it to a directory where marketer's sign up to spam it with links to the sites they were paid to promote. It sucks...
Anyways, I'm just wondering if I would get banned from SMF community for doing so. I can always add it back in if need be, but I really don't want to. I was wanting to submit the site to the SMF showcase, but don't want to start any problems with the powers that be.
It has been reported elsewhere on the forum that you can remove the copyright but then you get no support. So it seems to be your choice really.
However I wondered what the situation would be if you were to encode the copyright line into a decimal entity.For example copyright becomes copyright
This would preserve the copyright notice and it would still be legible and clickable and may fool the bots, but I wonder how SMF would view this in terms of support?
I don't think it would fool spambots. I even tried <!-- copyright -->
I didn't know if no support meant banning?
meaning the support team has the right to not answer any of your questions no matter what they are if you do not have your copyright in place. but this is assuming you are running 2.0.
QuoteWould I get banned from SMF Community if I removed the SMF copyright from my forum?
No, but that is not the answer to your spam problem.
I challenge you to prove that the copyright line is what's actually "attracting spambots", since I run several SMF sites that appears on page one of google and have a fair number of back links - and I have the SMF copyright - and yet, I don't have a spam problem since using questions, stop spammer and bad behavior+httpBL.
Not a single spammer has gotten through the registration process without being flagged and stopped for review and approval. And even those are few and far between at this point.
So... If you have some evidence, other than someone tells you "it's because of the copyright line", then it would be good to hear it, since we'd like to know....
It's like the people a few version back claiming that removing the version number protects the site from hack attempts... Completely false,
Ok my site is this:
http://xarthemes.com
Anti-spam mods installed:
bad behavior
forum firewall
Recaptcha - recently uninstalled due to errors.
My Registration Questions are:
Are You Human?
Ok, Let's Check. What is: Two + 1 Minus 3? (in words)
I have deleted over 400 spammer accounts about 2 months ago. Current 38 accounts on the ban list. I ban about 1-3 people a day for spamming. It got so bad I just disabled registration. There are members that will register, then wait a month or two before they start spamming. There are 1200 accounts, none have posted except for about 5, I believe them to be mostly spammers who haven't posted yet(some just put back-links in sig.). I still have 393 accounts on the waiting to be activated list. Heck, you can even see the spam on the site now.
As far as challenging me, I already tested the theory. I even tried changing the copyright to "Powered By: Simple Machines Forum". No luck. I don't feel like hunting it down, but there are several legit articles on how spam-bots are used to find sites with copyrights such as smf, ipb, wordpress, etc, but large active sites are avoided. Those sites are then placed into a directory for human marketers that work for companies hired by other companies or individuals to market their sites or improve SEO(link backs). I challenge you to research it yourself. I'm tired already of fighting it. I found my solution.
It's funny though how the spambots don't look for the credits page, they just search for the copyright on the homepage. Some try to overcome this by using a splash page.
Anyway, I don't want to ramble on and on about it.
Quote from: Xarcell on February 04, 2012, 04:07:51 PM
Ok my site is this:
http://xarthemes.com
I believe you have not properly configured your anti-spam resources. I ran a fews test on your site and I note the following:
- I could not find evidence that forum firewall is enabled. I ran several tests that would normally block me at my site and nothing happened. I can only conclude that if you are using the mod you are only checking ip addresses.
- I noticed that Bad Behavior is enabled but I am not sure if your are running the honeypot portion as advised. Using the honeypot database will block many known spammers.
- When I looked at your forum page source I saw no evidence of the usual Bad Bahavior index.template.php "bb2_screener" function. So the screener test is not being used.
- When I looked at your forum page source I did not see the usual SMF "<meta name="robots"" code. It seems you omitted the default SMF robots meta code.
- When I accessed your site with "Bad Behavior Test" the first time I was blocked, changed my UA and was blocked, changed it again and I had access. You should increase you BB cache.
- I checked for robots.txt and could not find it in the root directory. You should add it as advised here (http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=417490.msg3131785#msg3131785).
Quote from: butchs on February 04, 2012, 08:38:58 PM
I believe you have not properly configured your anti-spam resources. I ran a fews test on your site and I note the following:
- I could not find evidence that forum firewall is enabled. I ran several tests that would normally block me at my site and nothing happened. I can only conclude that if you are using the mod you are only checking ip addresses.
- I noticed that Bad Behavior is enabled but I am not sure if your are running the honeypot portion as advised. Using the honeypot database will block many known spammers.
- When I looked at your forum page source I saw no evidence of the usual Bad Bahavior index.template.php "bb2_screener" function. So the screener test is not being used.
- When I looked at your forum page source I did not see the usual SMF "<meta name="robots"" code. It seems you omitted the default SMF robots meta code.
- When I accessed your site with "Bad Behavior Test" the first time I was blocked, changed my UA and was blocked, changed it again and I had access. You should increase you BB cache.
- I checked for robots.txt and could not find it in the root directory. You should add it as advised here (http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=417490.msg3131785#msg3131785).
I don't understand alot of that. However I will try.
- Bad behavior is enabled.
- I see honeypot is not enabled. Lacks access key, but I retrieved one and applied it.
- Increased cache from 8 to 15.
- "<meta name="robots"" have no idea what that is but will look into it.
- "bb2_screener" function again, no idea, but will look into it.
- As far as forum firewall, I have no idea how to tell if it is enabled. I checked "enable testing" and "block violations". Is that correct?
- Robots.txt - will look into it.
When you said you had access, access to what?
My site is a SMF theme site. I think the reason the meta tag and bb2_screener isn't present is because it would require an edit to themes I've created and are demoed.
Quote from: Xarcell on February 05, 2012, 12:05:57 AM
I see honeypot is not enabled. Lacks access key, but I retrieved one and applied it.
That should help.
Quote from: Xarcell on February 05, 2012, 12:05:57 AM
As far as forum firewall, I have no idea how to tell if it is enabled. I checked "enable testing" and "block violations". Is that correct?
Partially, you need to enable each individual test. Ie "Enable IP Validation" will test ip addresses. Read the "?" a/k/a help for more information for each test. Please make sure you turn off block violations while trying new tests until you are sure you will not block your members and yourself.
Quote from: Xarcell on February 05, 2012, 12:05:57 AM
When you said you had access, access to what?
I just browsed.
I noticed you are running BB 2.1.13. You should upgrade to a newer version. The latest version is 2.2.1.
That's a new one on me, one of my sites has endured up to 350 attacks in one week, and I have been using SMF since version 0.07 or something, it was eight years ago, now on 2.0.2 and always showed copyright, besides how would copyright notice draw spammers?
I get spammers due to the high rankings in the search engines, it comes with the turf unfortunately. Like a movie star, the more famous you are, the more paparazzi follow you.
There are some great mods for SMF to prevent this, httpBL, badbehaviour, stopspammers and others and they all work extremely well.
Join in on the honeypot project where you can then become part of an international repository. Believe me when I say these measures work, the busiest site only get about 80-100 hits per week now and not one gets through.
You only have to see the logs in the website and the forums to know its working well, every two to three weeks I get an email from Honeypot saying I caught a new spammer. But a copyright message? I don't get it.
I was getting tons of spam users and posts, I installed httpBL added a logic question on registration and no spammer has gotten through since.
The logic question for registration should be more specific to your site and not a yes or no answer.
your questions are common ones so bots will get around that ... as ziycon suggested try asking more site specfic ones
Quote from: ziycon on February 05, 2012, 06:55:16 PM
I was getting tons of spam users and posts, I installed httpBL added a logic question on registration and no spammer has gotten through since.
The logic question for registration should be more specific to your site and not a yes or no answer.
I'm about to change my questions, but one of them is "What is the number of Banana's used to make the sky?"
One thing I've mentioned before here on the site that I saw another site do that was somewhat clever, is that they required a secret word. The secret word could only be found by reading their introduction topic. It was very well hidden in a few paragraphs of text and changed every so often. I realize this will limit the "lazy" who don't like to read things :) but I think it's worth a try if you are having serious problems with spammers.
Quote from: IchBin™ on February 06, 2012, 02:27:36 PM
One thing I've mentioned before here on the site that I saw another site do that was somewhat clever, is that they required a secret word. The secret word could only be found by reading their introduction topic. It was very well hidden in a few paragraphs of text and changed every so often. I realize this will limit the "lazy" who don't like to read things :) but I think it's worth a try if you are having serious problems with spammers.
At the same time, as much of a pain in the butt it may be, the only people that register will be the real people who want to use the site ;) Clever idea, really.
Absolutely, I don't have a problem in as much as it upsets the workings of the sites, but I do get a lot of attempts, the measures in place keeps them away, but you still have to be on your toes..
The serious ones (generally from Poland and the Russian states normally get routed elsewhere to a dump site that refreshes to other pages every 25 seconds then send them back. Its the return back that then gets them routed to some disgusting sites. Some get sent back to their own servers to screw around with the bandwidth there.
Most of China is blocked and every known Chinese spiders are blocked.
This topic made me look at the logs trend from potential hack, spam, dictionary, attacker ET AL and it's dwindling, so perhaps they are now going to more fruitfull places and giving up. This time last year the sites were getting 350-400 hits per week, now its 70-80 so the mods and the Honeypots are doing their job.
That is a good idea to have the answer to a question that's part of a mission statement or Agreement, I must apply that to my game squad site. Certainly thought provoking.
Quote from: Zaphod on February 05, 2012, 06:00:56 PM
You only have to see the logs in the website and the forums to know its working well, every two to three weeks I get an email from Honeypot saying I caught a new spammer. But a copyright message? I don't get it.
Interesting I too have sen an increase in my Honeypot activity since I added 18 random Honeypot traps to BB. I did not know you can update your Honeypot so that you can get caught spammer email messages. COOL! 8)
I didn't know that either. Thanks for the tip. :)
I know this topic is a month old, but would it be acceptable to replace the SMF Copyright with an image containing the exact same text? If spammers find your website via Google / Yahoo / Bing searching for copyright text, then an image without any alt or title tags would suffice. Am I wrong? Is this allowed?
if you are using 2.0 you can do what you want, but the team could consider it copyright removal and not provide you support. if you are using 1.1.1* you can not modify the copyright in anyway.
So is´t allowed to place an image in the Footer.When the copyright text isn´t clickable anymore.
For example something like this.
(http://i.imgur.com/QDTrk.png) (http://imgur.com/QDTrk)
The resized version
(http://i.imgur.com/uTl0y.png) (http://imgur.com/uTl0y)
technically thats allowed, issue for that is that Simple Portal will have a nice day taking legal action as that is aainst there license. However why would you want to do that?
Quote from: RunicHowever why would you want to do that?
Not for meself ;).........Just react to
Quote from: XarcellI learned that spam-bots scan sites with the SMF copyright, then submit it to a directory where marketer's sign up to spam it with links to the sites they were paid to promote
Actually spam bots scan for much more than copyrights these days. Your better off putting things into place to prevent registration etc. There are plenty of mods to help with these issues.
yes... that whole story about spambots or hackers searching for the copyright statement is just so much BS... (and hiding the version number is not any form of "saftey" either) there are a dozen other (and more effective) ways to figure out what software a site uses... then again, it's not like they even care. I get hack/spam attempts on Wordpress and phpBB type urls, even though I have never run either of those softwares.
including all populair softwares like : joomla,mambo,wordpress etc..etc.. bots get smarter but its temporily good to disable registration and install httbl,stop forum spammers and get the prober API key's for some of those mods install the API's and then you enable th!e right mods before you enable registration again...
did a few tests and seems to work properly just got one spammer in 30 days and was blocked :P
and if ya can dont try to use caching will help a lot !
True. I don't get a live spammer make it past the defenses but once in a rare while. I see all sorts of Joomla, VB, Phbb, wordpress, and various other types of probes repeatedly and I have never had any of those scripts on this account before. The SMF copyright is there with version number. I really don't believe that the copyright being visible has any bearing whatsoever on the amount of bots visiting a site myself.