Listed Networks Spamming

Stefano · Eleet Joined: 03 Apr 2005 Posts: 528 Location: Beirut

euhhh jason, plz tell me that u dont allow listed networks to be spamming.

Mary · SearchIRC Admin Joined: 03 May 2003 Posts: 692

Stefano, if you are asking if we will remove a listed network because they are accused of spamming on other networks, the answer is no.

If someone spams SearchIRC's forums, we will usually warn first, then delete the person's account so they can't post any more.

Jason · Posted: Oct 11, 2006 4:39pm Post subject:

It sounds like he wants to know if we list networks that he thinks are spamming other networks.

The problem with that is that:

1) That situation is unrelated to us. We are a network listing service, nothing more.

2) We have no way of knowing who the spammers are or if they are even related to the network

3) We have seen time and time again, people willing to go to any length to discredit or badmouth others, so it could be someone pretending to spam for a network in order to get that network kicked off SearchIRC.

We do not have the time, nor the will to investigate this kind of nonsense. Each network has the tools for them to remove users who don't behave.

Stefano · Eleet Joined: 03 Apr 2005 Posts: 528 Location: Beirut

Well i understand.. why complicating things to you. well i was asking because indeed one network was like spamming on mine and bugging my users for a while.. i thought a word/warning from searchirc and he will behave.
question: wouldnt be nice to put a sort of aup on submitting his network? such respect ther other listed networks bla bla... u know some rules of respect.
im afraid some are using searchirc as if its GPS satelite to get to know other networks to go spam on them..

Mary · SearchIRC Admin Joined: 03 May 2003 Posts: 692

Its not because it would complicate things for us. We've never ignored an issue because of the amount of work involved.

It would seem to me that networks would WANT to be respected by the IRC community. In that way they will attract quality staff, loyal users, and the admiration of their peers. But SearchIRC can't *require* networks to respect each other.

Spammers are pariahs. They don't get respect from anyone. They are hated by admins and opers. No self respecting person would want to be part of their staff, and in my experience, users that come over as a result of spamming are not loyal. They leave as fast as they came.

Building a network is a slow, steady process requiring hard work, personal attention, and technical ability. There aren't any shortcuts that produce long term results.

There are programs to detect and eliminate spam. Jason used to set up bots with odd names that were very effective at removing spambots before they became a problem. I am sure he can provide more information if you are interested.

Several years ago, botmasters clued in that mIRC's servers.ini was a ready made list of connect servers to dozens of networks. They also found out that at least one IRC network listing site had a servers.ini of their own with even more networks than mIRC. It was also pretty easy to harvest server lists from the xdcc search websites. Almost overnight networks were swarming with spam bots, botnets, and roaming xdcc bots looking for traders. Because we wanted our networks to feel comfortable about being listed here, Jason and I decided NOT to produce a SearchIRC servers.ini file, and we placed limits on the number of pages a visitor could see in a given period of time to prevent bots from harvesting the server lists from our networks sections. Unfortunately, if your network is listed in one of these servers.ini lists, there isn't much you can do besides change your connect server (for example, from irc to irc1).