This has been a crazy spam week for me.
For the past few months I’ve been using Akismet with the Math Comment Spam Protection plugin. The usual number of comment spam I would get was between 25-50 daily, with almost no comments ending up in spam.
Then Lorelle suggested that I remove the Math Comment Spam Protection and install Spam Karma2 and Bad Behavior. It made sense. And since I deeply trust Lorelle’s judgment on anything WordPress, I did it.
But since changing, I’ve been bombed with spam comments. Just yesterday I got 1,400 spam comments caught by Akismet – and that doesn’t include the 800 that Bad Behavior says it caught.
What gives? Why am I all of sudden being bombarded with spam?
Lorelle told me, and I ultimately believe her, that the Math Comment Spam Protection didn’t work. So no fault of hers.
Yet this tidal wave of spam hit me when I took down Math Comment Spam Protection and installed Spam Karma2 and Bad Behavior?
Coincidence?
Have I set something wrong with Bad Behavior and/or Spam Karma2? Or did the Math Comment Spam Protection plugin really work for me?
What are your thoughts?
Have you seen a huge increase in comment spam this week?
Any great resources for Bad Behavior or Spam Karma2 setup?
I use Aksimet & challenge question on more popular sites, it’s working good. Surely we are in need of better solution. I’ve used to think that OpenID might be a ray of our hope, but it looks like it has failed as well as other ambitious spam fighting ideas :/
I still use Akismet and average about 200 spam comments a day. It’s a mess. I don’t plan on changing, the war will not be won by switching software, me thinks.
Jason Alba
CEO – JibberJobber.com
:: self-serve career management & blogger relationship manager ::
Jason,
I hear you. I didn’t change away from Akismet – I just added SK2 & Bad Behavior. Akismet is still doing its job.
Have you seen an increase in spam the past couple of weeks?
Florchakh,
OpenID was a pretty good concept I thought too. Oh well.
How much spam to do you see in a day?
I see 40-50 damn spammy comments on PR5 site, daily, too :/
If “user” puts in a comment more than one URL, his comment goes to the moderation queue. Thanks to that fact some spams are broken, unfortunately there are also ones with single text link, or no text links :/
Hi Dawud,
I hope everything has been great with you lately. I’ve not had many opportunities to visit this past week or two. Not for the want of trying as they say.
There’s been an increase in spam comments on my blog too, probably during the past three weeks. I use Akismet alone, and have done since starting, so I don’t think it’s something to do with your extra installations (although I’ve not had nearly the same daily amount as you – more around 400).
Off topic, I’ve just launched my first ever WordPress theme (for personal use) and would greatly appreciate your thoughts.
I’ve had to resort to approving all comments before they go live.
Florchakh,
Yeah, I think I’m searching for the right formula too. Let me know if you have any luck yourself.
David,
Great to hear from you. For testing, I think I’m going to go back to using only Akismet for a few days and see what happens.
I’ve also been getting a lot of Stumble traffic, so I wonder if that plays into it at all.
And I will definitely check out your theme – likely later today.
Medical Spa MD,
Ooh! Yuck. I get too many comments (no complaints) to manually moderate all of them. Do you get lots of comments?
Dawud, I can’t say that I’ve seen an increase in spam over the last few weeks. Just consistent.
What bothers me is the SMART spam! Stuff that isn’t so obvious to catch as I scroll down the list…! Bleh!
Jason Alba
CEO – JibberJobber.com
:: self-serve career management ::
Dawud
As a follow up to Wendy’s post of a few weeks ago, do you think it has anything to do with the “dofollow” plugin? Just wondering as was just getting ready to jump onto the do-follow bandwagon.
Jason,
Funny, things are calming down a bit.
On the smart spam…I’m getting more and more of this too. I even let one through the other day.
Ed,
Maybe, It is likely that spammers are targeting no-nofollow folks – it only makes sense. And it probably doesn’t help that we’ve got a little community on one of the social networking sites.
But truthfully, I want to give every thank you I can back to those who comment on my site. So unless no-nofollow gets really hard to deal with around spam, I’ll put up with the extra headache.
Dawud,
The last week it’s gotten worse for me. Several a day sneak through and need manual intervention.
Ted,
Thanks for dropping by. I’ve talked to a number of blogger who have not commented here and they all report an upswing in comment spam. And, like Jason suggests, more sophisticated.
I have been getting a lot of spam even though my blog isn´t that popular yet. I think half my visitors are spambots! There seem to be new types each week. It started with the keyword prn sites, then I started getting medication ones and then the smart spam popped up. It never ends!
Genesis,
Thank God I don’t get a lot of prn spam. Mine is either meds or auto ins. What a pain.
It probably will never end…
I just deleted a couple thousand spam comments myself. Some always get through to my site, and I constantly delete them.
Its good that someone out there is smart enough to make a program that gets around the spam protection. They are very capable.
I hope they also use their power for good =)
Alex,
Is it a pain in the butt?!?!
It would be nice to see spammers do something good. But I’ve yet to see it.
Just learn to live with them and love them. It’s not like they’re going away right? So you’re just helplessly resisting pushing against a wall. It doesn’t take but a few seconds to delete the spam. =)
Alex,
I don’t want too accept it. I’ve been known to break down walls – physical, as well as emotional and spiritual ones. So I’ll keep looking for the right solution. And as I find it, I’ll share it.
I just recently installed Spam Karma 2. Before that I was manually moderating spam — and I did not realize how much time it was actually taking me until I had SK2 in place.
But I, too, have noticed an increase in spam comments getting through recently. An SEO pro told me that the end of July is expected to be a Google Page Rank update and that spammers are trying to get links in, especially on the dofollow blogs, before this happens. Don’t know if that’s true, but that’s what one person thinks.
As long as their’s software out there catching the spam for me, i’m happy.
I have two poker blogs, and because of the subject I get a ton of spam. One site has over 200,000 spam posts caught while the other one is up to 70,000. I just use Akismet and I rarely have any spam comments get by.
Anita
Time, that’s the issue isn’t it?
The Page Rank thing makes sense. All I know is that for a couple of weeks I saw a ton of extra spam. It just seemed to coincide with installing the new plugins.
Poker Mac,
I can imagine you get a ton of spam. Akismet is working that well for you, huh?
Dear friend, if your getting so much spam, the best tool to get rid of all those junk comments is to use the WordPress Comment Blacklist tool which is already there on your blog, thats if your using a WP blog software
Dev,
I agree. And I am using WordPress.
As your pr increases, number of spammers around your website also increases. I can’t understand how careless they can be. I think Akismet is the best solution and comment moderation as well.
I been getting a lot of spam as well. I have to agree with mert. As your PR increases, the spam increases.