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October 20, 2004
Trackbacked
But, wait, there's more:
And it just keeps on coming:
It is almost funny but really not at all. I forget what I came here to write. Where are the women? Hopefully free of some of the disgusting email, comments and trackbacks web visibility can bring.
(Sorry, this isn't a very positive post but I just needed to share a moment of dismay.)
Posted by Foe at 02:42 PM | Permalink
Comments
Ugh. Thanks for deleting them, Foe!
Posted by: Jill at Oct 20, 2004 3:03:12 PM
The problem is that I can't delete them all. I can only delete the ones that appear on my posts. When I get the notifcations via my email, my email app flags them as junk (but seems to let the valid ones through). If only TypePad could do the same...
Posted by: Foe at Oct 20, 2004 3:12:15 PM
If you're using WordPress, you can block a lot of comments with appropriate keywords. UnSpace has been under attack like that.
Searching on "Comment Spam" and whatever you're using to run your blog might help.
It's a shame you're getting hit with this. This is a nice blog, and I just added it to my blog role. I found it from Burning Bird.
Posted by: Rob at Oct 20, 2004 3:29:45 PM
When working on the Vagina Monologues, there was an email list that i was part of i - vagina@mit. To this day, i regularly get spam that says things like: "Vagina - want to enlarge your penis?" I can't help but ROFL.
Posted by: zephoria at Oct 20, 2004 3:54:52 PM
The worst I've seen is referrer spam where someone hits my site with a referrer they want me to visit. Of all the people least likely to follow such a link you'd think people who read their referrers would be one of them.
Posted by: Michael Conlen at Oct 20, 2004 7:38:35 PM
Michael,
I think referrer spam is aimed more at people who *publish* their referrers: that is, anyone who has publically available web stats, and anyone who has referrers as a sidebar on their blog (I've seen people do this).
And the aim isn't really them or their viewers, it's Google. By publishing their URL on a googlable page, you've increased their ranking.
Yet another cute toy that spammers are destroying. I like my web stats, but it's basically unsafe now to take any data from any potentially scriptable source and display it on your webpages.
Posted by: Mary at Oct 21, 2004 6:21:46 AM
Thanks Rob but we're using TypePad so there's no easy solution to this problem.
Posted by: Foe at Oct 21, 2004 7:18:24 AM
I'm in the process of raising hell with the TypePad support people. Every single one of those pings has the *same* URL in it--it's not rocket science to block that. I did it within two minutes of the same thing happening on mamamusings, using MT-Blacklist.
And while I have global ability to delete them, I have to do them one at a time, which is *really* time-consuming. I deleted about 50 yesterday, and then gave up, because they kept coming. I was assured yesterday afternoon that the problem was being addressed, but this morning the pings are still there, and the most recent one arrived at 4am.
I suspect we won't be using TypePad much longer. It's just a question of finding the time to make a switch.
Posted by: Liz Lawley at Oct 21, 2004 8:41:06 AM
Yikes! it's kinda funny, but it's the kind of funny where it's only funny if it doesn't happen to you.
Posted by: travis at Oct 21, 2004 9:24:30 AM
Oh, is that where they went? I got the notifications in my email and duly logged on to sweep out the sludge, only to find it'd been done already.
Thanks, Liz!
Posted by: Dorothea Salo at Oct 21, 2004 12:25:15 PM
at least you can notice it, the referrer spam appears on a page you notice. a page which you can control.
i manage a bunch of different websites, and there's a mad amount of spam happening on webalizer usage statistics. some of the sites i manage are low traffic educational websites... and i'm stunned to see in our referrer logs, long lists of porno sites.
i'm trying to find a way to 'fix' it, but i don't know how to stop it. afterall, webalizer is only reporting on the facts. but because it is displayed on a HTML file, the tempatation is there for the spammers. the obvious thing is, we need to make sure, if we use webalizer, that we don't allow the logs to be public. BAH! i wish i could stop them linking to my sites.
spam is depressing me.
Posted by: heather james at Oct 21, 2004 10:27:34 PM
Here's a woman, here's a woman!
Re: Spam, oh, how I hear you. You can imagine the spam I got in response to some of my posts about the election, or erection '04 as I called it.
Thanks for your terrific blog. I hope they don't silence you or force you to turn off comments, but if they do it won't stop me from reading you.
Posted by: Surfette at Nov 18, 2004 4:27:51 PM
