Jenny S.

I'm starting to pick up more and more spam bot signups on my PHPBB forums. Most of them simply register, include a website link and a few keywords in location, occupation and signature, and never activate. The sign-ups seem to be automated, or are there really trolls out there that sit on the computer spamming on 12/31/07 at 11.51 pm EST? They do somehow manage to read out the activation code which is provided as a jpg.

Sole purpose of theses sign-ups seems to be to boost an URL for Viagra, Cellphones, etc. in google rankings by creating many back links. These signups typically have

- no referer or user agent
- a bogus ICQ number
- bogus email account (.uk, .de, .com, .au, etc.)
- a changing proxy IP

I actually didn't mind this as long as it was happening in moderation, but lately some asswipe signs up with 15-20 different addresses every day, which is too much.

Can someone explain to me how that spam-biz works, what do people get really out of it doing this, and how it can be avoided?

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Jenny Seemore
Pornography is the bloody gladiator who stands guard over the First Amendment