Internet Marketing Strategies

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Blog Spam: How It Will Affect You and How to Minimize It

There is one basic fact of life when it comes to blogging; your blog is going to receive spam in one form or another, and most likely all forms!

The most prolific form is comment spam. Experienced spammers use highly advance programs (known as spam engines) to leave comments on thousands of blogs which contain links to the product they are promoting - much the same as those spam emails you receive daily.

They have evolved to the point where they can read the verification images displayed by some anti-comment spam plugins. Some can read and interpret javascript code, and renaming your form variables in the comment files is not a worthwhile solution. They can still find the necessary variables by reading and interpreting the comment form code.

The Askimet plugin which comes with WordPress is pretty effective at stopping spam comments appearing on your blog, but it places them in a moderation queue so you still have to review them and manually delete them. Unfortunately it often places innocent comments in the moderation queue, so you have to check regularly.

To use the Askimet plugin you will have to sign up for a WordPress.com account in order to receive an API key for use with the plugin. When you enter your details into the sign up form, make sure you use the “Just a username, please” option. Once you have succesfully opend a WordPress account, they will send your API key via email.

There is another option for reducing blog spam offered by the plugin called HashCash from Elliot Black which slows down advanced spam engines and virtually eliminates most automated spam comments from getting near your blog in the first place. The advantage of this is you don’t get spam held in a moderation queue because the spam is stopped before plugins like Askimet can do their job of filtering it out.

It works by picking a random large number every four hours. Whenever somebody visits your posts, a javascript is called which first decrypts itself, then executes itself again to retrieve a secret value saved in a .htaccess protected folder, which it then sets in the form. If a comment does not have this value, it is rejected. If a comment is rejected more than four times, the user is blocked for a specified period of time.

It is important to note that this will not stop a spam comment left by a visitor to your blog, so the best option is to use HashCash in conjunction with plugins like Askimet. This way you only have a few comments to moderate instead of hundreds or thousands.

Most spammers who leave trackback spam will never place a link to your blog on theirs. There is a plugin called Simple Trackback Validation by Michael Woehrer which reduces spam trackbacks by retrieving the web page located at the URL used in the trackback (in the comment on your post) and checking if the page contains a link to your blog: if not, the trackback is placed in a moderation queue and is not published on your blog.

Unfortunately there is no 100% reliable automated method of accurately identifying, trapping and deleting spam. Normal comments will be trapped (known as false positives) and you will have to review your moderation queue on a regular basis, but by using plugins you can dramatically reduce your moderation workload.

Happy Blogging and have a great weekend!

Alejandro Reyes
916.947.2455
skype: whoisalejandro

Popularity: 78% [?]

Share This