Spam in links submit! - links mgr contrib

I searched the forums but can't find any posts about this issue.

I'm getting spam through my "submit a link." There are upwards of a dozen a day now; they have a fake gmail address, a one-line, badly worded complement of sorts about my site, and then a list of links to various places on some site that doesn't really exist.

I tried requiring a link back, but apparently it isn't really required, because they can put anything they want.

I've tried going to the "whois" to see if it's an IP I can block; they are coming from all over the world (including the US).

Can anyone help me find a way to deal with this problem? Is there a way to implement CAPTCHA with links submission?

Thanks for any help!

An updated version of Links Manager is almost finished and it will incorporate an option to us CAPTCHA.

That being said:

CAPTCHA is good for all those roaming "bots" but it won't do much good if the spammer is willing to input the information manually.

Keep an eye on this Thread for more information

I'm also a lucky recipient of this spam.....

I've collected the following IP's and added them to my .htaccess

It seems to have helped

RewriteEngine on
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^216.(8[8-9]|9[01]). [OR]
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^64.156.213.228 [OR]
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^217.11.233.43 [OR]
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^64.92.167.179 [OR]
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^72.237.75.94 [OR]
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^72.237.74.119 [OR]
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^203.174.(8[0-9]).139 [OR]
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} ^217.11.233.44
RewriteRule ^.*$ - [F]

Feel free to try it out.

Better use "deny from" statement in htaccess for banning IP's - http://httpd.apache.org/docs/1.3/mod/mod_access.html

Clyde,

Does the previous version has the ability for the admin to review the link and then approve or disapprove? if not, will the new version has that? Thanks.

The current version has this feature.

admin -> extras -> Links

you can edit the entry for approval or delete an entry.

The new version will keep this ability.

I've tried using .htaccess to block this one bozo who is driving me nuts. I went back and looked at the million submission this site has made and there's a different IP addy every time and many of them are bogus. I think for my one "friend", Captcha would be neccessary and valuable!

Here's an updated list of IPs and Domains that I've blocked from my .htaccess

Order Allow,Deny
Deny from 217.11.233.*
Deny from 72.237.75.94
Deny from 72.237.74.119
Deny from 64.92.167.179
Deny from 67.19.238.252
Deny from 58.65.236.145
Deny from 203.174.83.140
Deny from .micrositehosting.info
Deny from .youfreehosting.com
Deny from fergalicous-fergie-lyric.micrositehosting.info
Deny from wholesale-lingerie.micrositehosting.info
Deny from ultram-er.micrositehosting.info
Deny from buy-carisoprodol.soignio.info
Deny from alltel-cell-phone.hostingcheapnet.com
Deny from cushman-motor-scooter.hostingcheapnet.com
Allow from all

I did the same thing for insurance-focus.com and dang if he didn't get another link submission through anyhow!

Doodlebuckets:

I did the same thing for insurance-focus.com and dang if he didn't get another link submission through anyhow!

the one that got through, did it come from the main domain name (insurance-focus.com) or from a sub-domain (subdomain.insurance-focus.com)?

He uses a different IP addy every time. I looked one of them up and it was in a list of masking IP addies, I guess what spammers use so they can cloak themselves. I don't know enough about it. But the emails that zencart sends with his submission have a different IP addy every time, from all different places on the globe. And in addition to that, I get a bounced email every stinkin time that says this:

[email protected]:
66.196.97.250 does not like recipient.
Remote host said: 553 VS10-RT Possible forgery or deactivated due to abuse (#5.1.1) [email protected] Giving up on 66.196.97.250.

The IP in the email is different every time too. It's very frustrating and time consuming to delete all his junk!

Spamers bot directly using page links_submit with parameters 'action', 'links_url', 'links_category' etc. To protected from this bots you also may:

0. Use CAPTCHA;

1. Rename page links_submit to any other, for ex. 'links_subm':

1. /includes/extra_datafiles/links_manager.php
   Line

define('FILENAME_LINKS_SUBMIT', 'links_submit');

replace by

define('FILENAME_LINKS_SUBMIT', 'links_subm');

2. rename /includes/modules/pages/links_submit/ to /includes/modules/pages/links_subm/
3. rename /includes/templates/<YOUR_TEMPLATE>/templates/tpl_links_submit_default.php to /includes/templates/<YOUR_TEMPLATE>/templates/tpl_links_subm_default.php

2. Rename parameters, for ex. links_url to links_submitting_url. Edit /includes/templates/<YOUR_TEMPLATE>/templates/tpl_links_submit_default.php and /includes/modules/pages/links_submit/header.php.

Wow, thanks Andrew! I will do that today! I sure hope it throws this guy off the trail...

I have tried all this thats posted and I am still getting these xxx rated ###### site in my links. I have denied the url that it redirects to and the url it's self. but all they do is change the url link and the new url still redirects to the same site.
how can I stop that.