I am identified as undesirable. RC : 1

Vienuolis · 2021-09-29 09:18:02

I just was blocked from forum.textpattern.com in attempting to log-in on Linux Vivaldi browser:

You are identified as undesirable. RC : 1

What went wrong? Now I am logged on FreeBSD Firefox, by the same credentials.

Bloke · 2021-09-29 09:37:34

I get this sometimes if I’m trying to log in over a VPN. Other times it’s fine. Seems hit and miss so it might just be an IP check that matched some list?

Vienuolis · 2021-09-29 09:51:08

Bloke wrote #331682:

it might just be an IP check that matched some list?

My IP address was certainly the same. And I have been logged on the same Linux Vivaldi earlier. And not from now.

gaekwad · 2021-09-29 18:04:44

Very likely an IP address or subnet block, Vienuolis.

The forum checks login details against Stop Forum Spam as part of our anti-spam strategy. I am not aware of it using any browser fingerprint or signature, so that be a new thing. If your IP address triggers that warning again, please check it against SFS here:

www.stopforumspam.com/search

Your username has not been blocked or banned here, and the last time everyone was inadvertently banned was nearly 8 years ago…

colak · 2021-09-30 04:05:34

gaekwad wrote #331685:

Your username has not been blocked or banned here, and the last time everyone was inadvertently banned was nearly 8 years ago…

everyone?

Vienuolis · 2021-09-30 13:07:41

gaekwad wrote #331685:

Very likely an IP address or subnet block, Vienuolis.

Now I log in twice each time: successfully from Firefox, after fail from Vivaldi — both ways by the same 88.223.222.96.

www.stopforumspam.com/search

Oh, it is listed here, really. With a weird description:

28-Sep-21 17:46 ‧ 88.223.222.96 ‧ Vienuolis ‧ “email@domain.tld”
Toxic IP address or “bad” email domain

I almost never used this email address. Just the day before yesterday tried to register myself to forums.freebsd.org and still have not received confirmation request to “email@domain.tld”. Hence, I was complained as a spammer instead, wow!

> Edited the email to prevent it from been harvested.
Yiannis

Last edited by colak (2021-09-30 13:28:49)

gaekwad · 2021-09-30 18:31:08

colak wrote #331686:

everyone?

Late 2013: forum.textpattern.com/viewtopic.php?id=40372

colak · 2021-10-01 02:32:20

gaekwad wrote #331688:

Late 2013: forum.textpattern.com/viewtopic.php?id=40372

I actually forgot about that!!!

Vienuolis · 2021-10-04 18:53:09

Why do you trust stopforumspam.com? Are they worthy of your trust? I spent some time reading their rules and forum — it is disaster. No proof, no verification at all. And no responsibility, no contact. The register is maintained by a single person, completely anonymous ‘pedigree’, as a spammer. He understands what he is doing — himself writes what unreliable and dangerous his data is for many innocent people.

I have made the removal submission last week, and confirmed an email sent to me. It should be sufficient — no one spammer contacts to disclose his privacy. And my IP address is clear, and username is real, and email address without xyz312-like mess. I never flooded by ads and links, I even have not made any post by this email address at all.

Is not there in this forum an option to block only those addresses with evidence? I would completely discard such an irresponsible source.

gaekwad · 2021-10-04 19:10:13

Vienuolis wrote #331720:

Why do you trust stopforumspam.com? Are they worthy of your trust? I spent some time reading their rules and forum — it is disaster. No proof, no verification at all. And no responsibility, no contact.

I cannot comment on how SFS works from behind the scenes at their end, but it seems to be very effective at our side. We have many malicious sign ups here every day, and without SFS we would be swamped with administration work with cleaning up. This forum is particularly attractive to some spammers because we are known as not using any SEO-reducing tactics. This policy rewards (if that’s the right word) the genuine users who link to their own properties, so there’s value in being a member in good standing.

I have made the removal submission last week, and confirmed an email sent to me. It should be sufficient — no one spammer contacts to disclose his privacy. And my IP address is clear, and username is real, and email address without xyz312-like mess. I never flooded by ads and links, I even have not made any post by this email address at all.

There do appear to be false positives, you are correct. My understanding of how SFS works is that each forum operator who wishes to submit and check details has a unique key, and submissions are tied to that key. So, if an operator does provide inaccurate information, it should be clear what other items they submitted and they could also be questioned.

Is not there in this forum an option to block only those addresses with evidence? I would completely discard such an irresponsible source.

If you know of a similar service that we could investigate using, please let us know. I am sure we could consider alternatives if it could be reliably connected to our forum software.

Vienuolis · 2021-10-04 21:09:45

I had in mind an option from the same source — some records in SFS are marked as ‘Evidence’, they might be proved.

colak · 2021-10-06 04:13:43

The problem is that spammers appear from new IPs every day. SFS, projecthoneypot, and cleantalk are the only ones I know which maintain spammer dbs. From these, SFS is the only one which we can find plugins for the forum and it is actually much less aggressive in comparison to cleantalk which maintains a much larger db.

Textpattern CMS

Textpattern CMS support forum

#1 2021-09-29 09:18:02