Spring Cleaning

[Impostor]

Of the 9660 members of LM, how many are fake? Or chatbots? Look at those profiles, and their signatures (birthday section).

[MattKingUSA]

That is a good idea.

[sunrat]

At Debian forums it's an ongoing process. Delete users with zero posts who haven't logged in for a couple of years.

[MattKingUSA]

At Debian forums it's an ongoing process. Delete users with zero posts who haven't logged in for a couple of years.

I think that's a good way to do it. But I worry that legitimate users could be removed. Maybe if it were users who have only logged in x amount of times. Like 2 years and only logged in 5 or less times. I wouldn't think that would catch too many legit users.

[sunrat]

At Debian forums it's an ongoing process. Delete users with zero posts who haven't logged in for a couple of years.

I think that's a good way to do it. But I worry that legitimate users could be removed. Maybe if it were users who have only logged in x amount of times. Like 2 years and only logged in 5 or less times. I wouldn't think that would catch too many legit users.

It's only users with zero posts and zero logins in 2 years we delete.
There are some members with zero posts who only read the forums occasionally, but if they haven't even visited in 2 years it's unlikely to affect legit users.

[MattKingUSA]

Alright around 3500 pruned.

[Impostor]

Alright around 3500 pruned.

Wow.

[MattKingUSA]

2 years 0 posts. There were many. Should prune once a year I guess. It took a while.

[sunrat]

Alright around 3500 pruned.

Wow, that's a large percentage of the member base. But then if they are not gonna post they may as well be guests anyway. Many were possibly sleeper bot accounts.
Do you use Stop Forum Spam here? We have found it stops a constant trickle of spammers from registering in the first place. Any new spammers get reported to the SFS database, and it's set so if a particular IP address appears in the database 10 times, they are blocked from registering. 10 times is so it reduces false positives.

[MattKingUSA]

Great question. I have admin access for moderating only. I am unable to do any server changes or maintenance. So I honestly don't know what is installed for spam. I do often ban by ip when there is spam. But may be able to check if it's listed in the admin.

[MattKingUSA]

I didn't see that listed. Would that be in extensions?

[sunrat]

I didn't see that listed. Would that be in extensions?

Yes it's an extension that would show in ACP Extensions.
https://www.stopforumspam.com/
https://www.phpbb.com/customise/db/exte ... orum_spam/