Sounds awfully similar to my issues.

http://www.oxwall.org/forum/topic/3857

I would like to have a hidden field that if it IS completed (as bots do) it trashes the sign in.
I currently deploy manual verification but I need to be told when new members join.

I haven't been hit hard with bum accounts. 

Was it for/from Asiangirl advertising uggboots?

No no, just one sign up going on about some mental health facility lol, god knows what it was about!

But... I'm fairly sure it was a bot and I would like to nip this in the bud, as I've run sites before many times and I know what it's like when bots start REALLY getting in. You open the floodgates!

A hidden field would be a nice quick way to fix this, as would recaptcha :)

Put both together along with random passwords sent to new users, and you're 99% bot proof (in my experience).

There is captcha in the join.  Not recaptcha though.
I would still love some IP monitoring on the site and maybe some ip blocking (ranges) if there looks to be a persistent offender although I suppose I can do that on the server.

Yuppers... juuuuust got my second bot...

The thing is... a standard captcha code isn't strong enough to stop them. On my MyBB forums, I use recaptcha AND a hidden profile field AND random passwords sent out to emails, ... plus I have a great team of staff!

Oxwall is really cool but.. I do think this is very important. Maybe there's some way to hack it in? o.O

I have to agree, registration will need a revamp as it is a social platform, there is the potential to annoy loads of people!

A must for any social networking platform.

Guys, what do you think about spammers that are real person? That are getting a penny for every spam comment they leave? In those cases no captcha would help and hidden fields would not stop them. What solution do you offer?

There really isn't any solution...

As for the bots: captchas are often easier to solve for bots than for humans, and e-mail verification or blocking is no hurdle either considering they can just create a thousand new dummy e-mail addresses in a second. I think people generally underestimate how automated these things are. Any solution that requires considerable manual intervention (e.g. blocking mail addresses) is no solution at all.

As for human spammers, all I can think of is manual verification. On my site, I have an additional profile question that new members need to fill in, where they have to write a sentence or two about why they are interested in joining the site. If you ask people to write something specifically about the topics of your site, it makes verification easier. Any registration that writes nothing, or some nonsense, in the field gets instantly deleted.

Daniel, great points so far.

I too have questions using multiple choice and two questions requiring a written answers.  If the multiple choice don't agree with the written answers they get deleted.  

I would need some help here. I need someone who can test my anti-spam plugin which checks the users email address, username and their email domain.

Please PM me, if anyone is interested on this.

We would try to remove as much as bots possible.

Thanks for the users who tested the anti-spam plugin.

I had the same problem and your answers help me. Thanks for it.

We also had big problems with bots on our website TopMedico.pl - gabinety medycyny pracy. However, recaptcha only partially helps. It gives a lot of cut on the server. Maybe someone has other ideas?

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