Wow, Brian, you got spammed

[Patri]

Especially in the Buying, Selling forum. Good luck cleaning it up. I wonder why you are so special?

 

[pedro47]

Brian, please delete all these spam topics ASAP.

There are over twenty plus topics.

 

[WorldT]

And another just hit.

 

[dioxide45]

Yeah. I saw a lot of that when I was up this morning around 5:30-6:00am. I reported what I saw. Saw some more just a few minutes ago. It looks like they are likely trying to get their scam phone numbers to show up in Google search results so people call when thinking they are calling a legitimate companies customer service.

 

[dioxide45]

It looks like they hit a whole bunch of other boards recently too. When I search one of the phone numbers I see a lot of other internet forums in the search results.

 

[GT75]

I think that I deleted all that I saw this morning. Brian, they are getting around the spam filter because they aren’t linking to an Internet address. Is there a way to add phone number to the filter?

 

[RX8]

If a spammer spams 20 times, I think only one thread needs to be reported, not 20, because the user is going to be deleted anyway.

Edit: And here the spam come again! They are persistent. Do people really fall for this crap? How can anyone believe that what they post is a legit “HeLp CeNtEr”?

 

[dioxide45]

If a spammer spams 20 times, I think only one thread needs to be reported, not 20, because the user is going to be deleted anyway.

Edit: And here the spam come again! They are persistent. Do people really fall for this crap? How can anyone believe that what they post is a legit “HeLp CeNtEr”?

Yeah, when you report one thread the mods can see all posts from that user.

I think filters can be added based on keywords.

 

[pedro47]

The website just got hit again.

 

[TUGBrian]

geez, so many spambots this morning. xenforo is pretty good in that if you mark a new user as spam, it deletes everything they have posted at once!

hopefully that takes care of them, thankfully once its reported as spam similar registrations are blocked.

 

[AnnaS]

Good to know only one thread needs to be reported. I have reported in the past multiple threads....Thank you.

 

[TUGBrian]

yep, if its the same spammer just one is needed!

though its really not an issue either way, all the individual reports for that same person also get nixed when you delete the spammer!

 

[pedro47]

Brian, Looks liked you got spammed early this Friday morning.

 

[AnnaS]

Brian, Looks liked you got spammed early this Friday morning.

Yes.......for sure!!!

I am oblivious when it comes to these spammers on the boards. They can't be just/advertising/for sure they are up to no good.....do they steal information from the threads/users, website, all? TIA

 

[RX8]

They’re back…

I admit, I don even know what Robinhood is supposed to be. If I did, I wouldn’t think someone typing “GET~IN~COnnECT” is going to be from that company.

I googled the phone number. They are hitting just about every forum with this same scam. Not sure how they find the time to do all this work.

 

[dioxide45]

Yes.......for sure!!!

I am oblivious when it comes to these spammers on the boards. They can't be just/advertising/for sure they are up to no good.....do they steal information from the threads/users, website, all? TIA

It looks like they are trying to place fake information into SEO so it ranks high on Google Search results. It is a scam, but they aren't really trying to scam people on the boards.

What they do is create s fake customer service number for a big company. Sometimes an airline, email provider or financial institution. They get that fake information to rank high on Google Search or even show that fake phone number in the AI results we now see at the top of search results on Google. A customer does a web search on how to contact the company and sees their fake number and calls them with their issue. They try to scam them. If it is a financial institution they may try to obtain their credentials or otherwise access their money. If it is an email issue, they will try to get access to your email. If it is an airline they may help you book a new flight, which might be legitimate, but there will be a lot of added fees.

 

[SmithOp]

They’re back…

I admit, I don even know what Robinhood is supposed to be. If I did, I wouldn’t think someone typing “GET~IN~COnnECT” is going to be from that company.

I googled the phone number. They are hitting just about every forum with this same scam. Not sure how they find the time to do all this work.

I'm surprised you haven't heard of it, it's a commission free stock and crypto trading platform. The spammers are probably trying to access user accounts when they call the phone number being spammed.

 

[AnnaS]

It looks like they are trying to place fake information into SEO so it ranks high on Google Search results. It is a scam, but they aren't really trying to scam people on the boards.

What they do is create s fake customer service number for a big company. Sometimes an airline, email provider or financial institution. They get that fake information to rank high on Google Search or even show that fake phone number in the AI results we now see at the top of search results on Google. A customer does a web search on how to contact the company and sees their fake number and calls them with their issue. They try to scam them. If it is a financial institution they may try to obtain their credentials or otherwise access their money. If it is an email issue, they will try to get access to your email. If it is an airline they may help you book a new flight, which might be legitimate, but there will be a lot of added fees.

Wow - thank you for the explanation. Had no clue.