From mike at grouse.net.au Wed Jul 5 20:13:23 2006 From: mike at grouse.net.au (Mike Barnes) Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 20:13:23 +1000 Subject: [Receptacle] Who owns "Spam-Bot-Mod"? Message-ID: <642C81D7-1DED-4075-9CF8-3F17DB6081DF@grouse.net.au> Someone is running some add-on to something called "Spam-Bot-Mod" - who is it? It's not causing any big problems, so don't panic, but it's not been configured properly and is being a bit of a pain. It seems that it's set to send email notifications when it picks up a spammer, but the email address it's sending to is set as "YOUR- EMAIL at YOUR-DOMAIN". The upshot of this is that every time it detects a spam attempt, I get an error email in _my_ inbox because the address isn't reachable. Could whoever this belongs to, please put in your own email address or disable notifications? There are no clues in the headers as to what's generating the messages, and I really don't want to have to go into system detective mode. :) Thanks! From mike at grouse.net.au Wed Jul 5 20:25:48 2006 From: mike at grouse.net.au (Mike Barnes) Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 20:25:48 +1000 Subject: [Receptacle] Accounting Makes My Head Hurt Message-ID: While I think of it ... there's one more thing. For the purposes of the accounts, this month (July 2006) does not exist. I'm going to start the whole accounts system again from scratch, starting August 1. This is to make it so that everyone has one single starting point, which will make my life easier. If you've paid in advance past this month, you'll start on August 1 with credit for however many whole months you have in advance, as of right now. I'm going to run the last year's bank statements through the new system in about a week, so if you've got any back payments to make, please try to get them in by the weekend - it'll make my life a hell of a lot easier if I can draw a firm line between "now" and "then" and never have to touch the old figures again. Account summary statements for the last 12 months will be out in a couple of weeks, providing I don't need to do anything complicated with numbers to make them. If it turns out to require anything harder than basic addition, I will probably develop a severe headache and need to lie down. Starting September 1st, there should be auto-generated monthly statements going out for the month prior. Depending on how my forthcoming chat with my accountant goes, these may even be actual tax invoices. I cannot begin to describe how exciting this isn't. From kgray at midnightblue.net Wed Jul 5 23:25:16 2006 From: kgray at midnightblue.net (kgray at midnightblue.net) Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 23:25:16 +1000 (EST) Subject: [Receptacle] Who owns "Spam-Bot-Mod"? In-Reply-To: <642C81D7-1DED-4075-9CF8-3F17DB6081DF@grouse.net.au> References: <642C81D7-1DED-4075-9CF8-3F17DB6081DF@grouse.net.au> Message-ID: <31815.202.65.16.33.1152105916.squirrel@receptacle.org> Shite... sounds like me, I'll fix it. It's a Phpbb mod (was having a problem with spambots) . > Someone is running some add-on to something called "Spam-Bot-Mod" - > who is it? It's not causing any big problems, so don't panic, but > it's not been configured properly and is being a bit of a pain. > > It seems that it's set to send email notifications when it picks up a > spammer, but the email address it's sending to is set as "YOUR- > EMAIL at YOUR-DOMAIN". The upshot of this is that every time it detects > a spam attempt, I get an error email in _my_ inbox because the > address isn't reachable. > > Could whoever this belongs to, please put in your own email address > or disable notifications? There are no clues in the headers as to > what's generating the messages, and I really don't want to have to go > into system detective mode. :) > > Thanks! > _______________________________________________ > Receptacle mailing list > Receptacle at lists.receptacle.org > http://lists.receptacle.org/mailman/listinfo/receptacle > From mike at grouse.net.au Wed Jul 5 23:56:04 2006 From: mike at grouse.net.au (Mike Barnes) Date: Wed, 5 Jul 2006 23:56:04 +1000 Subject: [Receptacle] Who owns "Spam-Bot-Mod"? In-Reply-To: <31815.202.65.16.33.1152105916.squirrel@receptacle.org> References: <642C81D7-1DED-4075-9CF8-3F17DB6081DF@grouse.net.au> <31815.202.65.16.33.1152105916.squirrel@receptacle.org> Message-ID: On 05/07/2006, at 11:25 PM, kgray at midnightblue.net wrote: > Shite... sounds like me, I'll fix it. It's a Phpbb mod (was having a > problem with spambots) . Just to sidetrack - does it actually work OK? I've got the same issue with a couple of boards, and I'm getting close to just shutting them down due to all extra work they're causing. Also, if you haven't seen it, the "active members only" mod is pretty useful. Doesn't stop them registering, but it stops the visible effects. Nobody shows up in the member list, or anywhere else, unless they've actually responded to the activation email. http://www.phpbb.com/files/mods/active_members_only_1.1.1.mod I am still at a loss as to why that isn't the _default_ behavior. From kgray at midnightblue.net Thu Jul 6 00:29:34 2006 From: kgray at midnightblue.net (kgray at midnightblue.net) Date: Thu, 6 Jul 2006 00:29:34 +1000 (EST) Subject: [Receptacle] Who owns "Spam-Bot-Mod"? In-Reply-To: References: <642C81D7-1DED-4075-9CF8-3F17DB6081DF@grouse.net.au> <31815.202.65.16.33.1152105916.squirrel@receptacle.org> Message-ID: <32929.202.65.16.33.1152109774.squirrel@receptacle.org> > On 05/07/2006, at 11:25 PM, kgray at midnightblue.net wrote: >> Shite... sounds like me, I'll fix it. It's a Phpbb mod (was having a >> problem with spambots) . > > Just to sidetrack - does it actually work OK? I've got the same issue > with a couple of boards, and I'm getting close to just shutting them > down due to all extra work they're causing. > > Also, if you haven't seen it, the "active members only" mod is pretty > useful. Doesn't stop them registering, but it stops the visible > effects. Nobody shows up in the member list, or anywhere else, unless > they've actually responded to the activation email. > > http://www.phpbb.com/files/mods/active_members_only_1.1.1.mod > > I am still at a loss as to why that isn't the _default_ behavior. I think the mod partially worked, in that the spambots couldn't register. Spambots typically try to form-fill a whole registration page, along with the www and sig fields. This mod removed those fields, so anything trying to fill those fields was a spam bot (humans wouldn't see them at all) and could not register. The other thing that it was supposed to do was turn on the www field at 10 posts or more. *This* was broken, so I was about to back up the db, upgrade phpbb, and try again. I'll rethink what mod I'm going to use now though. It was also supposed to notify me on spambot attempts but as it was misconfigured, the mail wasn't going to the right place! I've disabled my boards for the time being as the webcomic isn't being updated at present. I am at a loss too as to why accounts are allowed to exist at all if the admin doesn't approve them. The 'active users only' mod sounds good, but it still lets the beggars register, and then I have to go in and remove them (I installed the Admin User List mod as well, makes that easier). My partner got tired of the admin stuff on his board over at auslowcarb.com and he paid for vbulletin. Seems quite spam-bot proof so far, but you do pay for it!! > _______________________________________________ > Receptacle mailing list > Receptacle at lists.receptacle.org > http://lists.receptacle.org/mailman/listinfo/receptacle >