Lack of interest Spam Cleaner: Remove profile data

[DragonByte Tech]

Currently, the spam cleaner does not remove any form of profile data when a member is banned for spam. Avatar, signature, website, about and location should all be removed when a member is banned for spam, since those are some of the primary avenues of spam links even without any posts.


Fillip

 

[djbaxter]

It seems to me all you need to do is deny access to Members from unregistered guests - problem solved.

No posts = no signatures, avatars, website, or anything else visible to search engines = no benefit to the spammer.

 

[DragonByte Tech]

It seems to me all you need to do is deny access to Members from unregistered guests - problem solved.

No posts = no signatures, avatars, website, or anything else visible to search engines = no benefit to the spammer.

What if that's not desirable to some websites?


Fillip

 

[Chris D]

Avatars are already removed btw.

What would be the purpose of removing everything else, though?

The profiles are no longer viewable on account of the member being banned.

 

[DragonByte Tech]

Avatars are already removed btw.

Does that also work with Gravatars? IIRC I had to manually remove an avatar from a spammer today I could be misremembering though.

EDIT: Seems like Gravatars do not set avatar_date so they would not trigger the avatar removal in the spam cleaner. Should I start a new bug report?

What would be the purpose of removing everything else, though?

Personally, I prefer the data removed because I use database queries to find older members who has had spam edited into their profiles / signatures so I can clean them accurately.

At least on our site, spammers are wise to the fact that spam is less likely to get them moderated if they post seemingly innocuous posts then edit spam into their profile info.

For me, removing the profile info is a way to execute some database hygiene - I could flip the question around and ask whether there's a reason for this not to be removed?

That being said, if you don't see value in removing profile info / adding an option to remove profile info, I can just add it to our Spam Clean add-on.

The profiles are no longer viewable on account of the member being banned.

I didn't know this, as I've not tried to view banned members with a member account.


Fillip