I did all of that, infact I changed the signup slug to something completely random by just punching the keyboard randomly and those dam sploggers keep on appearing.
Something I have noticed is that if only a handful of users experience a problem and the devs and gods aren’t experiencing it then its regarded as a non issue. Sorry for being so blunt but thats just the impression I get.
There are many threads with problems by users that don’t go anywhere because of this.
“It seems like the Splog problem is not being taken seriously enough “
Sure it is – but a bunch of the devs have open test sites and aren’t getting hammered by splogs because they made a few simple changes, which they DID post about.
There’s tons of solutions posted all over. I’ve found you have to use a lot of them, the main one being change the default signup. Did you do that? Is your register slug custom? Have you added a couple of extra required fields on the signups page?
OK. Cant we make an internal feature to allow us to share list with eachother then so that we can fight these spammers. It really pisses me off and I wish I do DDOS attack on those domains and their IP’s.
Perhaps a plugin that can sync up with a latest list. It seems like the Splog problem is not being taken seriously enough
Working
WP single, WPMU 2.9.1 & BP 1.2
wp-ban
invisible defender
wp-spamfree
bp-links
bp-group-documents
On BP 1.2
Group Forum Subscripton for BuddyPress
SyntaxHighlighter Plus
Quanrantine (awaiting for soon? update)
bp-events
bp-groupblog
Sorry, but we don’t want a list of spammers’ domains listed here. Whilst you have a good idea, posting a list of domains is likely to be helping the spammers get better results in search engines, etc.
@bnt76
I have a couple of questions I have been playing with adding a (tweet this) to the link at the bottom where it says:
‘0 Comments (avatar image) admin created 5 seconds ago – (then here I would like to add a button for sharing)’
Cant find the right section to allow this do you have any ideas?
You need to look at link-loop-item.php, there are a TON of actions in there.
Another question as well is it possible to make the link section your home page, i.e. the first thing I want people to see is the link listing page, any ideas on how to do this?
This was possible on the old default theme using a widget, but I dropped the huge widget until I can maybe bundle an optional CMS type home page with the plugin so there is room for the widget.
Some suggestions (you can tell me to take a running jump on these!)
Is it possible to add a question in the link submission page (to prevent the inevitable spammers) like ‘whats 98 + 17 (enter in box) once they have given an answer the link is posted based on correct answer or wrong one throws up link could not be posted.
I have been thinking about this, and I’m not sure how to handle it yet. I would like to get some more suggestions from the community before I pick a direction.
The other idea is a bookmarklet code so people can post on there blogs etc, or some kind of iFramed box to show how many votes they have received on their blog once the it has been submitted.
This will be in the pro version.
I know I may be reaching here but I just think this is a fantastice piece of code.
Cheers dude, look forward to hearing from you.
Cheers!
This is without a doubt one of the best plugins I have ever seen.
I have a couple of questions I have been playing with adding a (tweet this) to the link at the bottom where it says:
‘0 Comments (avatar image) admin created 5 seconds ago – (then here I would like to add a button for sharing)’
Cant find the right section to allow this do you have any ideas?
Another question as well is it possible to make the link section your home page, i.e. the first thing I want people to see is the link listing page, any ideas on how to do this?
Some suggestions (you can tell me to take a running jump on these!)
Is it possible to add a question in the link submission page (to prevent the inevitable spammers) like ‘whats 98 + 17 (enter in box) once they have given an answer the link is posted based on correct answer or wrong one throws up link could not be posted.
The other idea is a bookmarklet code so people can post on there blogs etc, or some kind of iFramed box to show how many votes they have received on their blog once the it has been submitted.
I know I may be reaching here but I just think this is a fantastice piece of code.
Cheers dude, look forward to hearing from you.
@Bbrian017, you have to add that line to wp-config.php yourself + a few other things. It’s explained here.
It’s a bit of a hack, so I think it would be good if it became part of the basic setup, maybe at installation (wpmu).
I don’t see this register slug inside the wp-config.
What exactly am I looking for.
I could not find:
define( ‘BP_REGISTER_SLUG’, ‘yourregisterslug’ );
Also if it change the register page location do I have to create new files so it actually exists?
@jfigura I agree. That would be maddening in addition to confusing! The point we’re trying to make is that BP lets you set your password. That’s it. No email. Just login after you activate. When WMU sets the password, you have to wait and hope it wasn’t caught in spam and all the other associated issues. If you are receiving the email then something isn’t working correctly for you.
My own opinion is this way is much better (what are the chances you immediately forget the password you chose?) I hate it when I get generated passwords as I then have to go in and change them all over again.
Changing the register slug so far looks very effective in my installations. Could that be built into the core somehow?
Hey thanks again Ray 
This spam is a serious issue isn’t it?
I get the same crap on my pligg website! Spam after spam!
So it’s not only a buddy press thing.
Thanks for the link.
Nicola,
is this ready for the new version of buddy press?
Thanks,
Brian
@cyndy: I totally agree with you, Capthca’s are ony good for creating jobs in Asian countries and a useless hurdle to users. I second (third?) stwc and Andrea though: once changing the defaults, splogger change from several times daily to once a month….
Don’t forget to delete or rename (or empty if you want to avoid loads of entries in your error log) the wp-signup.php file, as that is what most sploggers come in on. Though I am pretty sure that now BP works on WP, some new methods need to be found soon on both sides of the fence
Apologies for spam but there’s another fix uploaded. Be sure to update
My install of BP 1.2 final on my WPMU doesn’t seem to work with the v1.6 Welcome Pack plugin. It activates fine, preferences save, but when new users join, they’re not welcomed with anything. Any ideas why it installs fine but doesn’t seem to work at welcoming new users? Thanks.
pjnu – Works for me. What type of WordPress MU install do you have (example.com/blogs or blogs.example.com). Anythign in your error log? Emails not being caught as spam?
Two of the suggestions above, changing the register slug and changing known text in the footer, are things I outline in my article Bowe links above (http://www.bp-tricks.com/tips_and_tricks/stopping-the-sploggers/).
Clearly, I can’t read. >_<
I actually already have Invisible Defender running — and I don’t know if it’s really done anything, but certainly it’s better than nothing. And my form is slightly tweaked; don’t know why I never thought to change the slug, though.
Anyway, thanks David!
@Cyndy: The two posts above you give alternatives to using captcha. It’s not the “only known solution”. SPAMers use bots. Bots look for known text and urls… like “Powered by BuddyPress” or http://www.mysite.com/register or whatever. Changing those things can help a lot. And invisible defender helps too. All without captcha. Which I think everyone will agree… sucks.
With all of the web standards and accessibility built into WP and BP, it really makes me sad that a captcha plugin is the only known solution to this.
Captchas are probably my biggest pet peeve on a site. Even the ones that aren’t horribly mangled pictures or have sound alienate those with vision and/or hearing loss. The BP site I run gets its share of spam registration — and like Andy I just mark them as spam as quick as I can. But a captcha isn’t going to help me in any way since 80% of my member base (including myself) are blind or visually handicapped.
Change the register slug and add more required options on the BP signup page. The sploggers look for the defaults, so change ’em.
Another good option is to change your registration page slug.
There is nothing protecting spammers from registering on testbp.org. I get some occasionally, but I nuke them with “mark as spam” as soon as they pop up. I found since with the new default theme spam has reduced significantly.
SI Captcha is a good spam prevention method. There really are a lot of options, but don’t search for “BuddyPress spam prevention”… this is not a BP issue, it’s a WordPress issue. You need to search for WordPress spam prevention instead.
