Black Monday For Comment Spammers (Wizbang)

Jay Allen is releasing a MovableType plug-in called MT-Blacklist on Monday.

I would like to be the first to congratulate him on an excellent implementation of a robust solution to a very complex problem. Banning IP addresses is NOT the solution as spammers and bots are easily moved and most users are connected to the Internet via dynamically assigned IP address.

As a special gift to users of MT Blacklist I am offering the biggest and baddest prefilled Blacklist on the planet right here: Wizbang MT Blacklist Add-on.

There is a flurry of activity around the release of the MT Blacklist plug-in so future directions are in the hands of a large and talented pool of testers. I have and will continue to offer my time to improving the plug-in and the end user operation of the plug-in. I would like to gather distributed knowledge of comment spammers into a central repository, but more details in that regard will be hammered out as the development process moves forward. I will keep you updated.

About the Wizbang Blacklist: This is a listing that I've put together from various sources over the past year for use in Internet Explorer to configure the Restricted Sites feature under Tools|Internet Options|Security. A little macro work in TextPad and it's ready for use with MT Blacklist.

Comment spammers, you're time will soon be up.

Update: After a few e-mail exchanges with Jay, I think there is a more valuable way of implementing this list. Expect an update this evening with a variety of choices for size and type of sites to filter.

The Wizbang MT Blacklist Add-on is in testing right now. Stability may not be achieved for a day or two.

Comments (5)

Kevin, you rock. ... (Below threshold)

1. Posted by So Cal Lawyer | October 12, 2003 1:25 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

So Cal Lawyer:

Kevin, you rock.

Posted on October 12, 2003 01:25

Very cool, Kevin. Upon ins... (Below threshold)

2. Posted by Jay Allen | October 12, 2003 6:47 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Jay Allen:

Very cool, Kevin. Upon installation, MT-Blacklist installs a default blacklist, to make sure that people are already protected against known spammers. Since I've been working on this, I've been importing other people's blacklists and using regexps to consolidate the particularly bad ones (phentermine, viagra, etc).

But here's the thing: 6600 domains is a LOT. The plugin is very fast, but obviously adding that many domains will slow it down at least noticibly. Looking over the list, I see that these aren't all comment spammers. It looks like a modified hosts file for blocking access. It would probably be better to reserve spots in the blacklist for domains that are actually being spamvertised, no?

Posted on October 12, 2003 06:47

wow. good job.... (Below threshold)

3. Posted by Ted | October 12, 2003 10:24 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Ted:

wow. good job.

Posted on October 12, 2003 10:24

I hope I do not get on that... (Below threshold)

4. Posted by Mousepads, Shoe Leather and Hope - The Great Grassroots Campaign | October 12, 2003 3:44 PM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Mousepads, Shoe Leather and Hope - The Great Grassroots Campaign:

I hope I do not get on that list. Some people got mad when I posted in their comments section asking if they wanted to trade bloglinks. I don't think that is spamming, but apparently a lot of people disagreed. If I posted here and made you mad I apologize.

Posted on October 12, 2003 15:44

Don't forget about security... (Below threshold)

5. Posted by Anchor | July 6, 2004 3:46 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Anchor:

Don't forget about security. Secureroot.org