The "free movie downloads" spammer is getting ridiculous.
 

You know who I'm talking about. At least twice a week, we're seeing the same spammer posting "free movie downloads" spam. Now, I'd usually not start a thread to complain about this, but we've been seeing this guy for months now and the problem hasn't abated. It's starting to get ridiculous.

It's almost certainly not "a guy", but a highly sophisticated very persistent effort. We block *well* over 99% of these, and always strive to improve. That said, we're very cognizant of the impact having algorithms that are too strict can have on the ability for new legitimate members to post (and you may remember a recent instance where a block meant to stop this very spam wave did cause an issue for some legitimate members). It's a difficult line to walk and one that is more complicated than most members likely realize. As always thanks for the feedback. This is an area we focus a lot of energy on and one we know impacts members greatly.

--jeremy

@Jeremy:

I'm just curious about something; Which possibilities do moderators have to deal with this, especially the removing of spam threads?

I've noticed over the years that mods have their own sub-forums and that they can (globally) ban spammers, but it seems they cannot remove (all?) the spam threads. Is this due to lack of permissions or are there only a few mods that can do this specific action?

If at all possible, could mods be enabled to remove spam threads (globally)?

Most spam threads are reported rather fast, which reduces some of the face time, removing them faster would reduce it even more.

While we don't release specific information about mod capabilities, the ability for them to deal with spam on a more global level is something that's on the roadmap.

--jeremy

I should have seen that one coming :)

That's nice to know! Thanks.

Is it just me, or have we been seeing a lot more of this spammer over the last few days?

I'm also still seeing mods locking the spammer's threads for other mods to remove later, instead of just removing the threads themselves, like they should be empowered to.

While you may be anecdotally seeing a few more, believe it or not as a percentage we're catching significantly more than previously due to a recent improvement on our end.

--jeremy

Perhaps the system could quickly be adjusted so that you can't post content containing hyperlinks unless you've got over 250 posts to your name...

The negative impact that would have on legitimate members would far outweigh any benefits it would offer over our current URL limit.

--jeremy

I've a nice mod for vBulletin that has effectively eliminated this type of spam from my forum:

jeremy: drop me a PM if you'd like more info.

You'd probably be shocked if you knew how many anti-spam measures we currently have in place, but I'm always willing to look at additional measures of defense. Feel free to email me any info you think might help and I'll take a look. Thanks.

--jeremy

You've got mail! ;)

We've made a small adjustment specifically targeted at the movie spammers based on TenTenths info. Much appreciated.

--jeremy

Based on this thread I've taken a closer look at recent spam treads here at LQ and based on that I've made a few adjustments that should also reduce all spam in general. If you notice a difference either way, feel free to post in this thread.

--jeremy

I'm almost worried that some of the regular posters here will be blocked due to their horrible spelling, grammar, capitalization, use of bang's and so on!!!!1!

:)