I am getting malicious spam comments on my blog.

LewieP

It's not a huge deal, but I thought that maybe there would be something I should be doing about it.

At around 2am today, my blog got bombarded with some malicious spam on a load of my recent blog posts.


It started out as stuff like -

spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt spamming cunt ;-)
How funny is that?

But then it became more personal -

"Tax man will hear about this undeclared income, did you tell the dole office?"
(for the record, I am not currently on the dole anyway, I am a full time student)

Then after that was my full name and address repeated over and over again, which I have never given away on my blog before, although I have mentioned what city I live in.


I am in the process of deleting all of it, and I have changed it so that anonymous comments require moderation before they are published, but is there anything else I should be doing?

DarkPrimus

Can't you get the IP of the poster, and use that to find out where they are posting from?

If it's some sort of uni grudge you can take it up with the officials on campus.

LewieP

It was my home address actually, not my term time address.

My parents house in fact, maybe I should get tube on the case.

DeShadowC

Yeah if you have the IP address of the poster, which your blog should log, you might want to pass it on to the admins and see if anyone here might have a grudge against you. Although I'd hope not.

seasleepy

I'd be pretty freaked out about someone having my address personally, unless your blog's on a domain you've registered through your parents' place. Some research on the IP at least is definitely in order, and possibly turning it in to some sort of authority.

LewieP

I am pretty sure there is no way for me to find out the IP through blogger. Google isn't coming up with anything...

LewieP

Bloody hell, I guess it is pretty personal.

My parents are both involved in politics, and the spammer, masquerading as my dad, with his full name said

"You'll get me and the party in trouble for all that shit you started in spamming the web you twat."

then

"Now lad if you want to avoid grief you need to go back and start grovelling. Apologise enough and they'll let you off, it's what the party does all the time."

These got blocked by the moderation, but I guess that confirms its being done by a "pathetic individual" not "nasty script"

Pheezer

If you have an actual domain name registered you have to provide your address. Since you don't, I don't know if you provided your address on blogger or made it available elsewhere. There's got to be some method of checking IP addresses used to post comments, but it might be a setting that you had to have turned on in the first place.

Personally, I'd just do a better job of hiding my information, disable anonymous comments, and get on with my life. It's probably nothing.

LewieP

Pheezer wrote: »

Personally, I'd just do a better job of hiding my information, disable anonymous comments, and get on with my life. It's probably nothing.

Yeah, I think that'll be what I do, I just thought that maybe there was something else that could be done.

From what I can tell, I can get a bit of html and embed it in my blog to track IPs, but, as you say, it would have had to have been beforehand.

ihmmy

you blog with blogspot, yes? I'd report it as harassment and see if perchance they can do anything

VThornheart

I disagree with Pheezer on this one, it seems to me like it's definitely a person and not a bot... those messages were a bit too personal. I could see a bot spamming your address... but spamming your address and *then* spamming information based on personal information concerning who his dad is and his involvement in politics? It'd be an impressive bot that'd pull that off. The who and why will probably be up for some investigation on your part, and possibly the authorities. Personally, I imagine that (since whoever it is has proven that they know your home address and who your parents are) if it even remotely turns to any kind of physical threat you could have the police on this job. Whoever the little bastard is that's doing it won't be laughing for long if he ends up in cuffs.

Rotam

What a dick.

Whoever is doing this should be in the human failures thread in D&D.

This is not cool, VThornheart said something about getting the authorities involved if it escalates and I agree with him.

Would it be something to do with your Blog being successful as of late?

LewieP's Mummy

Problem is, you can google me and Lewie's dad and find out stuff about both of us, if you know our names, which lots of people do. I'd never really thought about stuff like this before - I've not used my name in the fora here, but that's cos my link to PA is as LewieP's Mummy, so it made sense to me to use that as my name, not to keep my ID secret.

Its sad that its happened, and cos (of course) I believe everything I see on CSI, Grisham could sort it out in a flash, have the guy arrested, charged and jailed all in one episode.

We used to get abusive phone calls from someone who knew our children's names - they'd hang up if we answered, but if the sprogs did, they'd hurtle abuse at them. Oh, there are some sad people in this world.

If it carries on, or escalates, I think we'll talk to the police, for now, I'm going to talk to a couple of people and see what they say.

LewieP

Is it paranoid of me to notice that this site has just launched in the exact same timeframe?

oddment

Actually, I'd say that may be a fine place to start your investigations... not paranoid at all. Though who ever is running that must be nuts if he/she was the one who spammed your site. Doesn't appear to be any reference to who runs it on the site though... and they've pretty much abbreviated your site bio to make their own. I wonder how they advertise their site? Perhaps they post on a forum too... Me thinks a google search is in order!

Wulf

LewieP wrote: »

Is it paranoid of me to notice that this site has just launched in the exact same timeframe?

Well well well, you might have something there. Maybe.

Rook

Wulf wrote: »

LewieP wrote: »

Is it paranoid of me to notice that this site has just launched in the exact same timeframe?

Well well well, you might have something there. Maybe.

I think it's probably paranoia since they're doing blu-ray and DVD films as well, and you have to expect competition anyways since you've been telling us how profitable it is. I'd just step up what I was offering with more interviews/articles/compos etc.

Willeth

I'd definitely be willing to contribute some content if you wanted to fill it out a bit.

And seriously, get in touch with CheapyD.

Wulf

Rook wrote: »

Wulf wrote: »

LewieP wrote: »

Is it paranoid of me to notice that this site has just launched in the exact same timeframe?

Well well well, you might have something there. Maybe.

I think it's probably paranoia since they're doing blu-ray and DVD films as well, and you have to expect competition anyways since you've been telling us how profitable it is. I'd just step up what I was offering with more interviews/articles/compos etc.

Sure, but its harmless to ask blogspot, and it was mentioned that they sponged some material from his site already.

Willeth

What would be totally awesome is if they just copied the links verbatim, and so were still using Lewie's referral links.