Does forum account ban = IP ban?

[silvergoldandbitcoin]

Just wanted to ask something of whoever is knowledgeable:

When an account gets banned from bitcointalk, does the IP address associated with that account get blocked?

If it does, why?

If it doesn't, should it?

My opinion is that scammers will just connect through a proxy service or tor. So there is no point in banning IPs.

[ljudotina]

Banning IP adress is as stupid as it gets, as 90% of worlds connection has dinamicy IP adresses anyway. They eather change every 24h, or they change on reconnect, or both. I can change as much IP adresses as i want, whenever i want. Banning them would ban half of my Country. So IP ban is pretty muhc pointless as long term protection. You can ban IP to stop immediate threat like DDOS and stuff like that, but it doesnt work as mid term let alone long term protection.

[hilariousandco]

Not usually I don't think, but theymos does and has done IP bans in the past. Scammers will just use another IP like you said so it's pointless doing so in such cases.

[silvergoldandbitcoin]

Banning IP adress is as stupid as it gets, as 90% of worlds connection has dinamicy IP adresses anyway. They eather change every 24h, or they change on reconnect, or both. I can change as much IP adresses as i want, whenever i want. Banning them would ban half of my Country. So IP ban is pretty muhc pointless as long term protection. You can ban IP to stop immediate threat like DDOS and stuff like that, but it doesnt work as mid term let alone long term protection.

Oh wow I didn't know that IPs change so frequently. I understand now that IP banning is completely useless...

[silvergoldandbitcoin]

Is there a way to stop scammers from coming back? Or at least make it very difficult?

[hilariousandco]

Probably not, so that's why they don't really moderate on scams or ban scammers IPs. It's probably ultimately safer if they don't ban IPs as then at least theymos will know that person is using an alt account.

[Justin00]

with Tor these days it is hard to IP ban... I know the site blocks alot of exit nodes, but I am guessing their are heaps that get through as there are more and more each day who join the exit node club!

[blatchcorn]

The most effective solution is user education.  I don't think enough is done to flag-up potential scams before anyone gets ripped-off

[hilariousandco]

I agree with your first sentence, but the mods/admins don't deal with scams/potential ones. They're not here to babysit the community, but it's pretty good and swift in policing itself really, but it'll never be 100% watertight and scams will always be around as long as there's idiots and naivety.

[Dannie]

Just wanted to ask something of whoever is knowledgeable:

When an account gets banned from bitcointalk, does the IP address associated with that account get blocked?

If it does, why?

If it doesn't, should it?

My opinion is that scammers will just connect through a proxy service or tor. So there is no point in banning IPs.

Nope, because people can easily switch their IP with dynamic IP, tor, proxies, vpn, etc.

[theymos]

IPs are rarely totally banned, but IPs are often marked as suspicious. If you try to register using a suspicious IP, you have to pay a fee. The more suspicious the IP is, the higher the fee.

If you get banned, all of the IPs you've ever used on the forum are marked as suspicious. The entire /16 subnet of each IP also gets a small increase in its suspiciousness score. This makes evading forum bans difficult (or at least expensive).

with Tor these days it is hard to IP ban... I know the site blocks alot of exit nodes, but I am guessing their are heaps that get through as there are more and more each day who join the exit node club!

The forum always marks every Tor exit node as suspicious. You can get a complete list of Tor exit nodes from the Tor directory servers.

[jeffersonairplane]

IPs are rarely totally banned, but IPs are often marked as suspicious. If you try to register using a suspicious IP, you have to pay a fee. The more suspicious the IP is, the higher the fee.

If you get banned, all of the IPs you've ever used on the forum are marked as suspicious. The entire /16 subnet of each IP also gets a small increase in its suspiciousness score. This makes evading forum bans difficult (or at least expensive).

with Tor these days it is hard to IP ban... I know the site blocks alot of exit nodes, but I am guessing their are heaps that get through as there are more and more each day who join the exit node club!

The forum always marks every Tor exit node as suspicious. You can get a complete list of Tor exit nodes from the Tor directory servers.

How expensive is the fee?

[theymos]

How expensive is the fee?

Usually less than 0.001 BTC, but it varies.

[jambola2]

with Tor these days it is hard to IP ban... I know the site blocks alot of exit nodes, but I am guessing their are heaps that get through as there are more and more each day who join the exit node club!

Tor nodes are handled pretty well.

But, many people have dynamic IP addresses , so it is useless.
You can instantly switch IP addresses by reconnecting and it is always feasible , unless you are DDoSing then and IP ban is effective as you can't switch IPs fast enough.

[Malin Keshar]

There are not listed exit nodes made for networks that blocks the connection to Tor networks(this is why they say they are "known" exit nodes). Anyone can make an private exit node and give access to others.
There are also high anonymous proxies that basically gives no clue that you are using a proxy, and there are plenty of them appearing and disappearing day-by-day, so almost useless ban them.


And you need a "clean" IP only to make a account, after it have been created you can use tor network and suspicious IP addresses at will, so you could just go to a public computer and make a new account.


For me baning IPs is a zero-effectiveness measure for anyone that knows a bit about computers and internet

[theymos]

There are not listed exit nodes made for networks that blocks the connection to Tor networks(this is why they say they are "known" exit nodes). Anyone can make an private exit node and give access to others.

You're talking about bridges, which do not act as exit nodes. The Tor software does not support private exit nodes.

There are also high anonymous proxies that basically gives no clue that you are using a proxy, and there are plenty of them appearing and disappearing day-by-day, so almost useless ban them.

If they're talking to the forum, they'll need an IP address. There are a limited number of IPs (and especially a limited number of /16s), so they'll run out eventually if people keep using these proxies to abuse the forum.

[TwinWinNerD]

The fee is a donation to the forum?

[BawsyBoss]

The fee is a donation to the forum?

Not really a donation, since it is forced. But I believe that they are treated by staff as donations.

[BadBear]

It isn't "forced", you don't have to participate here.

[TwinWinNerD]

It isn't "forced", you don't have to participate here.

Yeah that was what I meant.

I ask because if EVERY tor signup is treated as that, then I imagine that 1000s of accounts are created using tor. Wrong assumption?