SPAM on the forums

aatfree

In the past 48 hours there has been some users spamming the forums. Why is the AAT Web team not removing these posts and banning the users? Is no one checking these forums? :mad2:

Poodle

I do not think that the the team at the AAT are.

You can report spam when you open the thread and yes there is a lot here at present I agree.

Perhaps we all need to go to the AGM and have this out with the powers that be, in public, after all we are paying for this through our subscriptions!!!

Poodle

A-Vic

Yeah ive noticed this myself its in almost every thread

aatfree

The reason this is getting me so annoyed is because I reported it when it started appearing 48 hours ago and nothing has been done. I've just reported some more posts but I don't hold out much hope anything will get done.

peugeot

I think it was CJC who has (on more than one occasion) recommended the use of moderators on here who can remove such posts at times when AAT website staff are not in the office.

I think they should seriously consider this request because no matter how hard the AAT web team try, they never seem to get rid of the idiots that post so much meaningless drivel.

Kind regards
Steve

Baggybooks

Is it just my imagination or are there more spam posts now than before the 'improvement's were made?

The last 48 hours seem to have been very busy.

sarahwilson

I agree, theres much more since the "improvements" were made, the only thing that seems to have been improved is ease of access for spammers.

aatfree

I think having user moderators is a good idea. I see they didn't deign to reply to CJC's post.

Perhaps if we inundate them with emails & PMs they might get off their collective posteriors and do something about the current spam problem.

118 11kate

I just reported spam and why is it I have to keep logging on everytime I want to post a reply before and after :thumbdown:

CJC

Looks like the admin have given up doing anything about the spam on the forum. How hard can it be to hit 'delete' a few times?

peugeot

Is it time we gave up then - everytime there's an "improvement" it seems to get worse than before (not that there was anything wrong with the forum before) - apart from the spammers!!

AdamR

Can't these forums be restricted to AAT members only - maybe requiring a valid membership number to be able to register an account?

What does everyone think?

aatfree

It's been raised before and Simon Smith of the AAT web team does not think its a good idea.
I'm sure CIMA has forums but they are restricted to members only and that hasn't hurt them attracting new members. Looking at a SPAM filled forum is surely even more of a turnoff for potential members.

A-Vic

i nominate CJC as monderator any seconds?

aatfree

Seconded.

Is it just me or is Quick reply not working?

umerali2003

Hello AAT Web Team

From last week or so the excess to the forums are getting tough and there are lot of spams writing the stories of there own !!!!!! well i am agreed here with my fellow members that this forums should have been restricted to the AAT members only or if this can not be done then the idea of moderator is not bad either lets say if we choose 4 moderators who visit these forms in different timing lets say one in the morning one in the after noon one in the evening and one at night so they can easily delete those posts made by spams and every thing will going to run smoothly .......

UmER Ali

CJC

I'd be opposed to closing off the forums to non-members, mainly for personal reasons but there are others who contribute to these forums who have moved on from the AAT and are not currently members. The scale of spam is not actually that huge, it's just that the relatively small size of this forum makes it particularly annoying. The trick is to find a solution that is effective against spam but is also proportionate and doesn't negatively impact usability for legitimate users - don't go doing the baby and bathwater thing.

I'm no expert on vBulletin but the latest version apparently implements the akismet state-of-the-art spam busting software which, it would seem, is not being utilised here although, given the relatively small scale level of spamming going on, being assiduous with deleting and banning would probably do just as much towards ameliorating the problem as fancy tech solutions. Unfortunately, the forum admins appear to have abrogated their responsibility to do this and so we're left with a forum increasingly clogged with cretinous spam.

aatfree

This is really starting to irritate me - one of these spammers has managed to rack up 35 posts. From what I can see there are two members of the AAT Web team who have posted on these forums:
Simon Smith
Agnieszka Grzywaczewska

Agnieszka Grzywaczewska wrote: »

If you are still experiencing difficulties please contact the AAT web team by email at: webteam@aat.org.uk

I think I shall send them an email because they are obviously not monitoring the forums.

square-peg

aatfree wrote: »

This is really starting to irritate me - one of these spammers has managed to rack up 35 posts. From what I can see there are two members of the AAT Web team who have posted on these forums:
Simon Smith
Agnieszka Grzywaczewska


I think I shall send them an email because they are obviously not monitoring the forums.

Simon Smith has left, so I wouldn't bother sending him an email! :001_smile:

aatfree

Looks like he's not the only one that has left.

This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.

Delivery to the following recipients failed.

WebTeam@aat.org.uk

square-peg

don't know why that failed, as that's the address I use, and I get a reply. I last used it this morning, and it worked fine. Have you got any pictures or logo's in your email that the system could be rejecting or anything?

Poodle

Hi

I have just this moment spoken to the AAT who have been receiving a lot of complaints about his forum and the website from members by phone. They are not even able to register new members at present!!

Apparently the IT team are in an emergency meeting as I type this to try ans sort out the problems.

I did suggest that one of them left a message to keep us informed as we are becoming a very angry bunch but.......

You know how it is so I thought I would post this

Poodle

sarahwilson

I think they need to do something and do it quickly. I am finding the site just about unusable,I have to log in each side of a thread reply every time thats all assuming my reply doesn't just vanish. The sites been up and down today terribly, and if I read one more reply telling me where I can get cheap war hammer I'm going to put my foot through my monitor.

What I really want to know is what exactly has been improved? Can anyone from the web team come and tell us that?

aatfree

square-peg wrote: »

don't know why that failed, as that's the address I use, and I get a reply. I last used it this morning, and it worked fine. Have you got any pictures or logo's in your email that the system could be rejecting or anything?

Maybe their inbox was overflowing with spam? My employer doesn't have any logo's except a large disclaimer message.

Glad to know that someone got through.

As someone else said the only thing that has improved since this upgrade is access to spammers.

richardw

I cant remember how it worked when i registered on here.

However, most sites that have forums have the following process

register with a username, password, email address
do captcha test (this stops automated systems)
registration approved by a moderator/admin
receive email to say approved, with a link to verify the email address

that system stops most spammers straight away, as they dont verify the email address
also, the time delay between registering & being approved puts off even manual spamming, but not real users


also, this is version 3.7.1 of vBulletin, the latest version, as at 26/08/08 is 3.7.3

PAMDILL

I've been trying to report spam and keep getting the error message that I am not allowed to access that part of the website.

PAMDILL

Yea,

Not had to log back on when trying to post a message or view a thread.

columbia

I'm seriously hacked off with all the spam. It seems that virtually every query has a crappy spam article amongst the replies.

I've found so many this evening, and have been reporting them for days, yet still they continue.

I appreciate that some will always slip through the net, but there never used to be this many, has anyone seen the ones typed in Chinese (or maybe Japanese!).

It's beginning to put me off coming on here, as it gets me angry!!

PGM

peugeot wrote: »

I think it was CJC who has (on more than one occasion) recommended the use of moderators on here who can remove such posts at times when AAT website staff are not in the office.

I think they should seriously consider this request because no matter how hard the AAT web team try, they never seem to get rid of the idiots that post so much meaningless drivel.

Kind regards
Steve

Seems odd theres not a handfull of moderators that can cover!

welshwizard

Could someone please email the spammers and tell them I don't want warhammer - or any other cr*p they're offering!

aatfree

I say we up sticks and visit http://www.accountancystudents.co.uk/ until they fix this little spam issue. Peugeot assures us that spam is removed on a daily basis.