Bitcoin Forum

Based on the last few 'spam attacks' (for example: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5061448.0 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5061448.0)) of newbie bots posting some shady and scammy links to ICO's or whatsoever,

i'd be interested in hearing what you guys think about restricting them from posting URL's at all ?


My suggestion would be to remove the whole [url] tags, including the link inbetween AND any link posted without [url]-tags (similar to the 'suspicious link removed' message).


IMO there is no necessity for a newbie (who didn't even receive 1 merit) to post any URL.

I'd include juniors in the restriction as well. One merit is too easy to get.

Yeah, was a lot of spam. Their latest examples are the RKT - 8 Robot. And in social networks and on our forum and in Telegram.

This was suggested before but nothing happened, I hope this time to have some solution.
Some time ago I came across one or two posts of newbies with changed link, they had the referral part of the link "cut out" from the legit link.  I think I got one PM too.

If scam is the issue, why don't we restrict people to post ICO ANN here? Aren't they scamming more? Lots of new ICO is launched daily and people lose thousands of dollar.
I'm agreed with you but if you consider scam, restricting ICO ANN will be more effective.
Also, because of those ICO ANN thread, spams are increasing too.

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I think theymos is not thinking about this now at all. Otherwise, in  recent updated restriction (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5030366.0), he would definitely add this one too.

The issue would be all the people who became copper members in order to participate to bounties. If you include them, they won't be able to post their weekly reports (facebook links, twitter links...)

But I like the idea : less spam, less scam, less phishing,less ref links, less shitty translations made by newbies...

With the introduction of new system several Junior Members were demoted to Newbie rank.  But we witnessed flood of Newbies getting one merit and again promoted to Junior Member rank.  Such a flood was not witnessed in the past.  
One question which comes to my mind is whether only juniors are scammers?  And what if the scammer is senior member?

 :) If Junior Members are banned for signature then It will motivate members like me to rank up.  So at one point of time it will be beneficial to us though it tastes bitter presently.  
I agree S_Therapist why not ban ICOs?  because lots of people are being cheated via ICO scams.

Right now newbie can post link of a website but caant post something like https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1rm_q8E3UHu6ndGL3ykll and also cant post link shortened. I think posting web link will not be forbidden for newbie.

If spam is the issue, then why not ban the website they're linking it to? Or, if they're doing it repeatedly, then just ban them altogether? No better way to keep the forum out of spammers than to filter and restrict their posts and/or ban them from the forum, right?

this topic is quite consistent with my yesterday's thought from another thread Newbies necro-posting and spamming to promote a referral link (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5061448.0)

Do you mean to make the links posted by newbies unclickable? Or for the forum to just wipe out any link that newbies post? Either way, both of them have their pros and cons, and a copper membership could solve the problems for newbies. But I could only see this happening if the issue of newbies spamming URLs on a VERY LARGE SCALE. 

I disagree sometimes newbies need to post a link for scam accusations or account reactivation for ban appeals. Implementing this will only give scammers more opportunities to scam newbies thus they cannot even provide links.

Far too extreme for a newbie. Not every newbie is a bot and looking to share shady and scammy links. Some newbies are genuine and looking to grow with the community as they learn and if you impose such it simply means new members are not welcome.
How will a newbie able to post from an external source if they not able to share a link of my source? won't it earn them an automatic ban for "plagiarism''?

Sometimes a newbie may need to ask for Help/support with reference to Links or Some other Newbie may be willing to help with reference using a link but can not do so because they can't post links. Now how does that help the community to grow?
Much as we need to get rid of Newbie bots, we should also consider that there are genuine newbies.

This is easier said than done. Spammers would just post ‘bitcointalk dot org’ instead of a actual link and search engines would still pick up the text of the link. The underlying reason why these spammers post these links isn’t to get forum users to click on them, it is to get search engines to recognize that bitcointalk has the link displayed on one (many) of its pages which helps the search engine rankings for the link.

A better solution would be to configure the robots.txt to somehow get search engines to not pick up posts by newbies that are not at least xx hours old. This would give mods time to remove the posts before search engines can pick up the links, and reduce the effectiveness of this spamming strategy to near zero.

The point is not to forbid any newbie to post links. Just to stem the massive amounts of spam.

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ICO Announcements are in a sperate sub. If people decide to browse that sub, they decide to see this spammy rubbish.

I didn't want to suggest restricting what people are allowing to post. Just spammy ICO shit in all the other subs (e.g. technical support, bumping 2 year old threads).

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I, personally, wouldn't include them because those spambots are creating standard accounts (non-copper) for spamming.
Those people aren't THAT retarded, to pay for creating an account simply to have their link displayed somewhere for 10 minutes.

I'd assume that copper members aren't just created to spam 1 link and leave.

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Of course not only jr. are scammer.

What i have said is that i would restrict newbies from posting URL's.

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Probably because there are multiple new websites created daily which are then spammed here across unrelated threads.
I think it would be way more effort to ban each site, than to simply restrict newbies from posting URL's. But both is a good approach.

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Not only unclickable, but also removed. Like it is happening with suspicious links (www.[suspicious link removed].com etc.), just for every URL from newbies.
IMO this spam is getting out of control.

A few days ago i had to report at least 10 of such spams, which were bumping year old threads.

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Exceptions can be made (e.g. scam accusation). This wouldn't hurt the idea, i believe.

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It's not that hard to receive 1 merit.
So, if people are really willing to learn etc.. they also will earn 1 merit.

And it shouldn't hurt to wait with posting links until then.

Beginners- / Spam accusation-  subs could be excluded from this rule, maybe.

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Wouldn't this already be way less effective in terms of SEO ?

Examples like this - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5063046.0
show that the suggested restriction would be a great advantage to the forum, and would reduce the wordload of the mods.

not really too extreme, most of the forum who were bombard with spam already did this to new accounts that they need them to at least be registered for several days before they can post clickable links. Theymos can do this by making the newbies avail the copper membership if they want to by pass the restriction.

I am not sure I agree with the idea of limiting thousands of newbies because of the activities if a few.
Posting phishing or scammy links I believe would get your account nuked, and users are actively involved in cleaning up the forum these days by reporting such posts.

Of course links are not really beneficial to a poster and should only be used when necessary but I don't think anyone should be restricted (or assumed to abuse the system based in rank)
Reviewing posts from newbies is a better suggestion, this would effectively eliminate spamming and those who break rules can be banned without their posts being made public.

There are genuine reasons for newbies to post URLs. Lets not make this forum unattractive to new members.

Spammers will find ways around it while genuine members will just leave.

Agree. Such restriction would hurt legitimate newbies who came here to announce their services for example. Ok, they can purchase Copper Membership? Yes, they can, but do you expect that many of such users will do that? I don't think that we should make forum not friendly to new users.
On the other hand, Newbies spreading referral or phishing links is a problem. Maybe ReCaptcha are needed for all Newbies to stop or reduce activity of bots. To publish post all Newbies would have to solve Recaptcha, it's common thing on other forums.

The thing is, that people are creating hundreds of accounts just to spam their link once per account.
They don't care if they get nuked. The whole purpose of those accounts is to get nuked after spamming their link.




Reviewing posts probably isn't possible with that much new posts daily.
Mods are already having a hard time moderating the rest of the topics. Additional reviewing wouldn't be practically doable.




The majority of 'service announcements' from newbies are simply scam. Everyone who has a LEGIT business/service, would be ready to pay a buck for copper OR simply get 1 merit.

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As writing this, new spammy site is being spammed:

I was 100% for this yesterday, with no restrictions.

Then I did realize that in the Mining section a lot of newbies need to be able to post a link to imgur or something of the sorts so people can assist them with troubleshooting. Even though it would also be helpful in the reputation section - I think it shoul d be blanketed accross the forum, or those sections will become the targets for the spam waves.

So I'd be all for links to be unclickable - and have a tag along side it [Disabled link from New member, proceed with caution]


Adding to that the warning message could link to t athread some fine member of the community can create regarding safe practices with links.

It would. I mean, filtering out some phrases should teach spammers a lesson. Just looking at the list of the websites OP shared, it would be helpful to ban that particular website, or at least certain phrases that they keep on using. They'll eventually find another way to spam, but that should keep the forum spam-free for a while.

This is a discrimination against to all newbie who were just starting up and learning in this forum. Of course newbie could barely get a merit because of the nature that they were new and still learning in this forum (unless if they were just spamming). There is no need for this to do to all newbies out there. This will limit them also to express their thoughts that could be back up by URL links to their claim.

OP you were just generalizing all the newbie. I know that you were after for the good of forum yet instead of scrutinizing the newbies here in the forum, we should welcome them. Sooner or later newbies could contribute brilliant ideas that could be a highly valuable input for the forum.

Besides the merit system introduce to jr. member rank requirement was effective in reducing spam posts.

The best idea so far and that is what I am thinking also, though it might be hard to make an algorithm for that certain program to minimize spam post made mostly by newbies in this forum, but for sure it is worth it and will surely eradicate spam posters. I'm looking forward on making that happen soon or maybe in the near future.