Spam block on forums borked?

[thefatmoop]

I keep getting this message about the system unable to verify if i'm spam or not. I type in the text in the picture then I only get the option to save as a draft...

Happened a few times when i have links and even when i don't have links.

[adafruit_support_bill]

Thanks for letting us know. We will look into it! please send a screen shot to support@adafruit.com

[thefatmoop]

sounds good i'll send it next time it happens

[Scott216]

I keep getting this message about the system unable to verify if i'm spam or not. I type in the text in the picture then I only get the option to save as a draft...

Happened a few times when i have links and even when i don't have links.

Me too, it's very annoying.

[adafruit_support_bill]

@Scott216 - If you see this again, please send a screen shot to support@adafruit.com so we can try to fix it. We are a very popular target with spammers these days and without some defenses we'd be completely swamped.

[wesg]

Is there a way to mark a user account as not spam after completing a CAPTCHA form successfully? I don't mind filling out a form once to confirm, but it should probably save that setting.

[adafruit_support_rick]

Most of the spam we're blocking these days isn't coming from bots - it's being posted by (sub-)humans. So passing a single CAPTCHA isn't quite enough to qualify an account as 'clean'.

It's a difficult problem, and we know how annoying the CAPTCHA is for repeated posting. But the current system has been extremely successful in nearly eliminating spam - it's been at least a week since I killed any. Just a few months ago, policing spam was a big part of this job. A lot of it was pretty raw - stuff we don't want our customers to have to be exposed to.

[wesg]

That's great. I'm very happy with the support and community on the Adafruit forums.

I had another thought that might help. I noticed on the account page that you request the forum username, so maybe it's also possible to determine human status by checking that record. I have an established purchase history with Adafruit with valid addresses, which hopefully differentiates me from the spammers.

I realize that's a lot to check on each post, but hopefully the more reliable parameters you have to check, the better the forum gets.