An Important Discussion about Spam

Hi Everyone,

It seems that many of our members woke up this morning to a message alert, but no message, from a member named Karia.

This person was a spammer selling - of all things - phones on a horse site.

I was notified by two members and immediately banned the spammer, so that she and all of her content were permanently deleted.

One of our members started a thread about her and fortunately everyone was very good-humoured about their vanished message.

I thought this was a great opportunity to share some information.

Spamming is of course extremely prevalent everywhere that people congregate online and as Barnmice grows, we will naturally attract spammers now and then. In the year since our launch we have attracted approximately a dozen spammers, all of whom have been caught within hours - even minutes - and immediately banned.

A spammer is different than a hacker. They are a person who signs on as a member, then starts posting the same sales message on many people's comment walls. They have only the same capabilities as any other member.

Spammers are likely to post in the middle of the night, usually on the weekend. Fortunately, as we have very quick-thinking members in every time zone in the world, spammers aren't here for long before they are caught, either by myself, or one of my members who messages me.

Most important of all, Barnmice is monitored extremely closely, seven days a week, and our admin team is only a quick message away via our "Report an Issue" and "Site Feedback" links at the bottom of the page. Or you can private message me any time at all at my Barnmice Admin page.

We are all extremely proud of this fantastic community and the positive and friendly environment that has been created by all of our members. We welcome any comments, ideas or feedback you might have regarding any subject at all.

p.s.
We do have the capability to approve new members before they can join, but I hesitate to use it because 99.9% of our members are "real" and want to get involved right away. What do you all think?

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Lori on March 28, 2009 at 12:51pm

Hi, I too had an alert that I had a message, but no message. I don't know if you need to know this but in case.
Thanks for looking after the site so well.
LA

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Permalink Reply by Barnmice Admin on March 28, 2009 at 12:54pm

Thanks for your kind messages, Lori and Ann! I'll continue to do my best! :)

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Permalink Reply by Mini Morgan on March 28, 2009 at 2:47pm

I also had a message alert, and since I tend to be on the internet in the wee small hours of the night (though I am NOT a spammer! :-) ) I did get to see what her posting was....ring tones. Urgh. I looked for a way to delete the message but didn't find one--good to know it's gone now, thanks to the admin team!

I know when I signed up it was nice to be approved immediately, without having to wait for a real person to approve me. Really, to me the spammers sneaking in and posting here there aren't a big deal, as long as they aren't able to leave a virus when they post--and I don't think they can--and if the administrators delete their postings sooner or later so that they aren't cluttering up the board. In life's list of annoyances, the spammers here are rather low in importance. Wish there were some way to delete some other annoyances just as easily!!!