Boosting PHPBB Bot Security

S. Thompson · Post by **S. Thompson** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 3:21 am

Any suggetions for cutting back on bot registration/post for a PHPBB forum? I seem to be having a problem with it as of late.

- Fuzmeister

impetus · Post by **impetus** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 4:51 am

Tell me about it. Freaking Russkies.

Skynet · Post by **Skynet** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 5:27 am

Does PHPBB allow for those entry code thingos you see before signing up to some places. Eg. a box with a random number/letter combination or whatever it is?

Post by **BlueCrab** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 8:24 am

Yes, they do. Also, you can use email verification. That's what I always did anyway.

S. Thompson · Post by **S. Thompson** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 11:21 am

impetus wrote:Tell me about it. Freaking Russkies.

Skynet wrote:Does PHPBB allow for those entry code thingos you see before signing up to some places. Eg. a box with a random number/letter combination or whatever it is?

I have the visual validation thing set up, but I'm not sure about e-mail validation. I'll have to give it a shot.

- Fuzmeister

Matt · Post by **Matt** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 11:44 am

Visual Validation is now standard. It seems to have stopped all of the traffic I was getting, which was mainly just random users with links to casino's in there profiles

curt_grymala · Post by **curt_grymala** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 12:05 pm

The image verification script (phpBB uses CAPTCHA for their image validation - YaBB uses a much more secure and intuitive method) is very effective against bots. Some bots have figured a way around CAPTCHA, but we haven't yet seen any figure a way around the script that's been included in YaBB. Anyway, either one is still very effective against bots.

However, the majority of these nasty spammers are now using new methods to avoid the image verification. Quite a few of them are actually paying real people to register on the boards they plan to spam, and then using a bot to actually post.

In most cases, these "real" people are not stupid enough to use their own email addresses to register the user accounts, so setting up your forums to require email activation is extremely effective against these bot attacks.

S. Thompson · Post by **S. Thompson** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 1:15 pm

Is e-mail validation built in to PHPBB, or is it an add-in of sorts?

EDIT: I think I found it if they call it "account activation"...

- Fuzmeister

Thomas · Post by **Thomas** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 1:23 pm

Yeah, account activation is email validation.