This blog is retired.
Acodricng to raserech at Cmaribgde uitisnevry, it dsoen’t mtaetr waht oredr the lteerts in a wrod are …
Can we use word mangling in captcha software? Unfortunately, no. According to the report of Dmytry Lavrov, “in many cases computer reads taht btteer tahn hmaun cluod”.
A Trackback is a method for Web authors to request notification when somebody links to one of their documents. … Some individuals or companies have abused the TrackBack feature to insert spam links on some blogs. This is similar to comment spam but avoids some of the safeguards designed to stop the latter practice. As a result, TrackBack spam filters similar to those implemented against comment spam now exist in many weblog publishing systems. Many blogs have stopped using trackbacks because dealing with spam became too burdensome.
I’ve already published an idea how to resurrect trackbacks: trackbacks should be performed through an intermediate, not directly. (For details, read this post, “decline and fall of the trackbacks; rise and resurrection of the trackbacks”.) Unfortunately, such protection depends on a third party.
And here is yet another idea, which doesn’t require an external service.
Last week I wrote about the “Spamper” phpbb MOD that used SPAM posts against the spammer. As I mentioned, the idea died because too many people thought that it amounted to a Distributed Denial of Service Attack (DDOS). No one wanted the legal liability that could result from what I believed was a great idea.
Well, I got to thinking… Maybe Spamper was a bad implementation of a good idea. So, I took the idea one step further. What do you think of this?
Sometimes there is nothing more satisfying than giving a bad guy a dose of his own medicine. That was undoubtedly the idea behind the “Spamper” phpBB2 MOD that was ultimately removed from the phpbb.com and phpbbhacks.com sites shortly after it was posted by its author.
Every now and then a smart anti-SPAM solution comes along that’s actually worth taking a close look at. ReCAPTCHA™ is one of those tools.
Everyone who reads my blog already knows that standard CAPTCHA utilities have been hacked. And you already know that the best form-based anti-SPAM tools require a modicum of human intelligence to unlock the comments form and allow a comment to be posted.
And that’s why I’m so excited about ReCAPTCHA. Not only is it human intelligence-based, but it’s free as well. And to make it even better, if you use ReCAPTCHA, you’ll actually be helping to spread literacy around the world.
Here’s how it works:
CAPTCHA or not CAPCTHA… Any anti-spam protection disturbs your visitors. But folks at HotCaptcha.com found a nice trick to compensate the irritating proof-you-are-a-human step. What they do?
For all the havoc spambots wreak on blogs their presence has actually done some good. You see, these annoying creatures from cyberspace have brought out the creative sides of blog owners determined to win this Battle of the Blogs.
To make my point read this post by Ned Batchelder titled,
(Continued from part 1.) Gather around Generals, I have hot intelligence straight from the high-tech weapons arsenal. The tide of the War Against Forum SPAM is turning.
With CAPTCHA, Spam Blacklists, and other low-grade weapons allowing the front lines of our defenses to be overrun, a new anti-SPAM weapon has hit the battlefield and initial reports are quite favorable.
Geez, where do I begin? Spam…it’s all about spam. Why can’t we all live in a wonderful e-world, filled with blogs, picture streams, and wonderful myspaces… without the hassle of spam. I guess it’s just like anything else, it’s subject to users and abusers. Hustlers I call ‘em; Skid Row-ers I call ‘em. Plain ‘ole scum of the Earth. What are we going to do? They are clever, very very clever… Well of course!– We must fight the fires with even clever-er(?) 
methods. CAPTCHA was a god-send. That’s one way. The boys over at bbantispam have come up with a simple yet effective way to wade through the masses of complex, yet somewhat feeble in circumstances, spam bots. Why boys, can’t you even say “hello”? I love it. Keep it coming bbantispam…’cause I’m ready to say “goodbye”. If you don’t know, they have even come up with an effective link rejector. They themselves said it best… what do spammers register everywhere for?.. duh! to post links.. The links rejector will phase through their links of garbage.
So why am I here? I’m certainly not here to compete. The folks at bbantispam certainly have a legitimate and effective product on their hands. I’m here to introduce, rather humbly, a little project of mine.
Introducing Forum Spammer List, or FSpamlist for short. This, in a nutshell, is an online database full of known spammer’s email addresses, popular domains, usernames, and IP addresses that are all easily exportable so that forum administrators can import them into their forum’s ban lists. With your help, this database can grow and stay current to aid in forum administrators everywhere to stop known spammers from even registering. Well, how can you help you might ask? This online database can be updated by anyone, anywhere. Well what about false-positives, JACK! Well, that’s when you’ve got to trust me… I’ve set-up a few security measures to keep the spammers out and the legitimates in. See a name in the database that looks like it shouldn’t be there?…just flag it using the link in the spammer profile page and the volunteer team and I will take a look it.
Well, I’ve said a lot… I’ve just pulled a shameless plug haven’t I? I wouldn’t like to think so.
I’ve come all this way to make a proposal to the folks at bbantispam. I, myself, have installed the Textual Confirmation tool on my forum. It works quite well might I add, and I noticed in the Readme (and in your bbantispam’s forum) that in the free version of the Textual Confirmation tool actually sends back the spammer’s data to bbantispam that gets the confirmation prompt wrong. I am proposing that on future feedback reports, that information would also be sent to FSpamlist for holding, and my team and I will look at the data and decide whether it is valid and should therefore be inserted into the database. Why would you do this for us? Well, I thought we are here to stop spam any way we can. But, I do understand the logic of barter, or partnerships if you would. This would be the first partnership of its kind. What I am offering you is complete and utter credit for all data sent to FSpamlist. Those exact terms are open to discussion.
Well, there I’ve said it.. I’m just one fishhook in a sea of spammers.
If you would like more information about my project FSpamlist please visit the following sites:
FSpamlist Main Page
FSpamlist Blog (for updates and such)
FSpamlist Forum (for open discussion)
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