Whoo's anti-spam techniques in one simple thread

[whoo]

8/17/06 Edit: this is NOT a hack or a plugin, however the information in this thread is in keeping with the topic of this area. A few other ideas expressed here use the same approach and of course, we have the same goal - a spam free blog.

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The code posting below include COMMENTS. They are for informational purposes, NOT to be pasted into files.. If you copy and paste code into your .htaccess, leave out the comments


1. b2evo comes with a blacklist. Update that frequently.

2. Change the URL to your trackback and comments.
Details follow:

A. Rename the /htsrv directory within your b2evolution installation. You may call it ANYTHING you like as long as you do NOT introduce spaces.

B. Edit conf/_advanced.php and change the following variable to match what you renamed htsrv to in step #A. See example below.

[mikel]

Thats great, whoo

thanks.

mikel

[Nate]

Thanks for this handy tutorial. Can you clarify what directory the .htaccess file should go in?

Thanks.

[whoo]

sure, nate ..

you may already have one in the "root" directory ( where index.php, mms.php, etc.. is ) of your blog install -- if not, thats where you would want to put it for all of the examples above to work.

a poorly formatted .htaccess is VERY unforgiving. One simple typo can render your site unavailable.

If you happen to mes up, and something "breaks", dont panic, just rename your .htaccess to something else, and take another look at the syntax you're using.

bold formatting == corrections

[kiesow]

a short addition for ppl who can't use mod_rewrite.
it's also possible to stop spammer without it.

e.g.

[Nate]

You mentioned _config.php being in the root directory of the blog. Mine is actually in the blogs/conf/ directory. So to further clarify, should the .htaccess file be in the root directory (in my case blogs/) or in the conf/ directory?

I'm asking because if I put the .htaccess code from your #3 above in my blogs/ directory I get an error. If I put it in the conf/ directory things keep running but I'm not sure it's doing anything either.

[whoo]

yes, i apologize.. I was actually looking on my hdd at the files as opposed to on the server.

To clarify:

the root of your blog install is NOT where your _config.php is .. It is where your mms.php, index.php, multiblogs.php, and others are. In fact, a newly unzipped b2evo has a sample.htaccess in the root directory already for you


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As for the errors, I cant help there without more info.

[captsolo]

Whoo, thanks for a comprehensive guide to spam prevention.

I had problems with part #3 - Apache rewrite engine going mad when it is entered into .htaccess. A fix for that:

[whoo]

your welcome anytime! and thank you to you guys for helping to make this thread more informational

[frank]

Whoo, Captsolo: Maybe I'm getting confused here but I thought the .htaccess snippets I was using were for blocking referrer spam. Comment spam isn't a problem on my site, it's the .ro and .pl referrer spam coming via a proxy at marketscore.com that are driving my traffic through the roof.

F

[frank]

Dear Whoo & Co,

I've come across another way of modifying the .htaccess file to prevent certain domains from making requests (i.e. getting referrers):

[whoo]

yes that should work

[whoo]

here is a pretty good working example of an .htaccess

hopefully this will clear up general questions about how things work..

[whoo]

yes, that does the same thing that the corresponding mod_rewrite rules do in the first post, your just applying it differently

cheers!

[Bryce I]

Thanks for this excellent information, whoo.