Bernhard ,
I have found questycaptcha to be the most successful at blocking bots from adding
users. Basically it asks a question such as "Where is Tokyo?" and the answer is
"Japan". This has been working pretty well but lately I have noticed that some
bots are still getting through so I might need to change my question.
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:QuestyCaptcha
Adrian
________________________________
From: "Scheid, Bernhard" <Bernhard.Scheid(a)oeaw.ac.at>
To: "mediawiki-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org" <mediawiki-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Sent: Wednesday, August 1, 2012 3:36 AM
Subject: [MediaWiki-l] spam users
Hi,
I am running a couple of relatively small academic Wikis mainly for educational uses at
university. Thus there is relatively little traffic apart from course time. Nevertheless,
some two years ago I noticed more and more spam and thus reduced editing rights first to
registered users, then to users of a special group that need my personal acknowledgement.
Now, in recent months there is an increasing number of new users (robots?) obviously
attempting to write spam which they do not do but they are kind of spamming the lists of
registered users. I could reduce the registration rights but on the other hand I want
students to register freely in order to obtain their editing permissions. Is there a
decent way to detect and prevent harmful would-be spammers from setting up an account
without preventing that option for serious users?
Best
Bernhard
***************
Dr. Bernhard Scheid
Austrian Academy of Sciences
Institute for the Cultural and Intellectual History of Asia
Apostelgasse 23
1030 Vienna, Austria
Tel.: +43-1-51581 6424
E-mail: bernhard.scheid(a)oeaw.ac.at
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