The bane of an Admin's life...

[Biker]

What we really need is a "Tachy Goes to Coventry" addon.

That has got to be the most worthless feature I've ever seen and am happy to see it wasn't included as part of XF.

AWS and I are discussing this individual case, in an effort to conclude it.
Other than this idiot, we have had no real issues with this type of thing. I'm loathed to use a hammer to crack a nut.

I have no issues at all in using tactical thermonuclear devices to swat a gnat. It means the gnat stays swatted. Permanently.

 

[MikeMpls]

That has got to be the most worthless feature I've ever seen and am happy to see it wasn't included as part of XF.

I would never want this as a base feature in the vanilla XF, and I can't imagine KAM spending time on such a non-core feature. However, there are occasions when I'd love to be able to throw in a "Tachy Goes to Coventry" addon, written of course by someone with time to waste.

 

[OSS 117]

I solved the proxy issue by encapsulating a useless field in flash that needed data to be copied to another non-flash field. Kind of like an anti-bot technique. Proxies wouldn't render the flash because flash is volatile when it comes to maintaining privacy. Free VPNs also blocked it. I've only seen very expensive subscription based VPNs render it, but those are made for surfing the web. For my current sites I just reroute proxies (IP via htaccess) to a Rick Roll videos, because it's hilarious.

Spam wise I just block most East Euro, African and Asian IP blocks, so I don't get inundated with useless traffic or hack attempts.

 

[Jon W]

I would never want this as a base feature in the vanilla XF, and I can't imagine KAM spending time on such a non-core feature. However, there are occasions when I'd love to be able to throw in a "Tachy Goes to Coventry" addon, written of course by someone with time to waste.

Clearly I have too much time. Is this what you are talking about:
http://xenforo.com/community/resources/force-ignore-by-waindigo.1907/update?update=4496

 

[Anthony Parsons]

I'm sure we've all had 'em but how do you make sure (in this scenario), the little bugger gets the message and stays away for good?

#1 - http://xenforo.com/community/resources/evercookie-ban.1587/
#2 - http://xenforo.com/community/resources/stopcountryspam-spam-combat.1016/ which contains a lovely little registration addition for stoping proxies without using any of the country blocking features:

 

[lazer]

Thanks Anthony, so no adverse effect on regular "ISP" visitors?

 

[Digital Doctor]

Troublesome member

Can you reconcile with the member vs fight ?

 

[lazer]

Can you reconcile with the member vs fight ?

Nope, this one's a fruit loop

 

[Mark3121]

I have had it set like that on my site since day one and in fact I used that for the example in the manual: http://xenforo.com/help/user-group-promotions/

Do you promote using the primary or secondary user group?

Thanks.

 

[Paul B]

Promotions only ever affect secondary groups.

 

[Mark3121]

Cheers , never tried it so was wondering about initial groups before I did anything, makes sense to have everyone in the registered primary group I guess.

 

[Ingenious]

Nope, this one's a fruit loop

Had a few of these over the years.

The way I look at it is this:

1. Any content they post before they "revert to type" is still good content that adds to the post count and the diversity of the board.
2. Any bad content can be removed so won't have a lasting bad effect.
3. While they're getting this out of their system, it's extra traffic (which always pleases sponsors).

So I tend to let them get on with it. Also you get them to realise that good content stays, bad content doesn't and gets them banned again. Sooner or later they either get bored, or realise they prefer to remain nice.

So you're in a win-win with this. Yes it can be a hassle, but in return for that hassle you get extra content

 

[lazer]

...unless all of the content is "Crazy-Town"

I'm really pleased that this thread has opened up into something that can help other Admin's too.

 

[tafreehm]

Hey

Here's the scenario...

• A user abuses staff and members via posts and PC's
• User is banned
• User re-registers under a different name and email
• User is banned
• User discovers proxies, registers under a different name, IP and email
• User starts abuse again
• User then shows identity thru posts and PC's and is banned
• Repeat point 5 - 7 (up to 8 times a day)

I'm sure we've all had 'em but how do you make sure (in this scenario), the little bugger gets the message and stays away for good?

Cheers

lol, In my scenario there is one more step.

• User goes to my facebook page and start manipulating other user's mind against forum and staff.

In that case, you cannot really do anything...

 

[digitalpoint]

There are creative things you can do to make it more difficult for a user. For example, one thing we do is if we think there's even a remote chance of an account being a duplicate (for example the IP being one used within a 100 mile radius of someone recently banned or anyone using a proxy) the user can ONLY sign up with a VERIFIED Facebook account. A user can't sign up with a Facebook account that is in use by another user.

So are end users going to go that far out of their way to create another Facebook account, verify it with a unique phone number (at the same time risk losing their normal Facebook account for violating their terms by having multiple FB accounts)? Most likely not.

But it still allows legitimate users caught as a false positive to sign up.

 

[Anthony Parsons]

Thanks Anthony, so no adverse effect on regular "ISP" visitors?

No... I've run that since it was pretty much made and it hasn't affected any regular visitors who use corporate proxies. Previous attempts at blocking proxies had affected corporate networks, thus I had removed them in the past. This one works effectively.

 

[DRE]

Spam wise I just block most East Euro, African and Asian IP blocks, so I don't get inundated with useless traffic or hack attempts.

How do you block those?

 

[Anthony Parsons]

How do you block those?

You use IP country blocking via a central repository. The above add-on stops those countries IP blocks from registering on your site, not viewing. You can do the same thing with viewing as well, as there are services you can link into to stop entire countries accessing your site without having to physically try and maintain your own IP list via your config firewall or such.

 

[DRE]

You use IP country blocking via a central repository.

I got like a hundred useless baidu bots from China. Does that use up my site's resources?

Don't know where they came from.

 

[Anthony Parsons]

http://xenforo.com/community/resour...ollection-anti-spam-complete-collection.1469/

The tools you want in saving resources from bots is in the above...