Topic: unusual number of new member signups?

[ncpilot]

Seems like the forum software change is resulting in a new member every few days... Some are obviously legitimate, others not...

Does this software check for spammers like the old version?

If so, I wonder why all of a sudden we seem to be getting so many new members, and it just seems to coincide with the software change...

[capeweather]

From what I've seen they are legit but Ken might have a better idea.

[saratogaWX]

The SMF forum software has a better version of Captcha than the old phpBB forum did, and we're using it at 'highest strength' available.  We also require the user respond to the activation email (to validate email address) and if an account hasn't been activated in a week or so, we remove them.

So.. yes, we've had more members sign up, some may have been spambots (but haven't spammed yet), but most have been real people .. just what we'd wanted 

The admins get an email for every member signup, so we're keeping close tabs on what's happening with registrations.

Thanks for your question.. hope this helped explain what we're doing.

Best regards,
Ken

[SLOweather]

I just checked several random new members' profiles (maybe 10) and all seemed legit in one way or another. Either they had a weather website listed, had a weather-related domain name email address, had an ISP-provided email address, or had been active since they signed up, (at least checking the forum a day or 2 later, if not posting).

[saratogaWX]

That's the same kind of screen I use Chris
I too check the email address and the website listed.. if suspicious, account gets deactivated.
Fortunately, with the stronger Captcha, the number of bot registrations has diminished to nil (knock on wood).  We'll stay vigilant as we too want this to be a good place to discuss weather-related topics and not be accosted by spam posts.

[ncpilot]

Good news then, for some reason we're getting a lot of new members all of a sudden...

[WeatherHost]

OK, The newest member showing now would raise some questions for me.

Please welcome dahacker, our newest member.

[saratogaWX]

Based on the username, for me too..

The first posting appears very weather related though.

[capeweather]

I thought the same thing until I read his posts....

http://www.wxforum.net/index.php?action=profile;u=477;sa=showPosts