Hi

This post was part of a thread my colleague made but I felt it was in the wrong Forum.
So I hope by posting it here I may get the help I need.

I'm a Moderator who has been trying to remove a troublesome member since May 2005.

This person originally created 12 accounts. She pretended to be different people - but after looking at her posts and crosschecking he IP's, it turned out these accounts were created using the same PC, So I banned her for the those reasons.

Now this was back in May this year...Her IP was different to the ones of her 'newly' created accounts - seems she changed ISP

I did another IP check based on a PM I received where she told me that she was the user who we banned in May.
It turned out that she had created another 8 accounts making the total 20.

On checking her IP and checking who actually falls within her range, it turned that I could only ban 20 ranges.

XXX.XXX.80.1 - XXX.XXX.80.254
up to
XXX.XXX.99.1 - XXX.XXX.99.254

If I banned anymore outside this range I would be banning other users.
So last night I set about creating this IP range seeing as Infopop doesn't support wildcards.
Put them in the IP Ban List and clicked on Save Settings
I went back to check and half the IP's were gone including some IP's that were already on the list.

This is unfortunate and I have run out of idea's to remove this person for good.
Also this user is harrassing a few people on the forums and I would really appreciate some advice on how to remove this user once and for all.

I considered writing to her ISP, but because she changed ISP's already, there is no point in taking that action

Hope you can help

Regards,

Chris(Bitebug2003)

PS. I registered Bitebug2003 yesterday and for some reason it gives me a user unknown... so I had to create this one.

quote:

seeing as Infopop doesn't support wildcards.

Entering XXX.XXX.80 would ban all IPs in the range of XXX.XXX.80.1 - XXX.XXX.80.254.

The technological options available to you are:
IP Banning
Email Banning
Require Email Verification
Moderate Registrations

I recommended to your colleague, contacting the user's ISP. Infopop recommended moderating registrations temporarily.

I really don't see any other course of action for you to take. You mentioned that you beleived she switched ISPs. Do you have any proof of that or is it just a theory? Note that ISPs often have mutliple blocks of IP addresses that are not continous. Also, she could have been signing in from home, work, or school, which would be a different ISP. Have you visited ARIN or RIPE to lookup where in the world this user is connecting from? Those agencies will provide contact information (often abuse@isp.ext) for the ISP.

Almost all ISPs prohibit spamming and harrasing in their terms of service, so contacting them can often be a good way of getting the user reprimanded or dumped.

Hi

Thanks for your reply

Yes, I believe that this user changed ISP for the simple reason that when she registered back in Dec 2004, her IP was static 4.4.X.X

It never changed. But when we banned her in May 2005 her IP suddenly changed to a dynamic IP 71.XXX.XX.XX
I did a whois back then to confirm that they were indeed two different ISP's.

So were I to notify her ISP and judging by her pattern, she will just change ISP again.

With regards to the Approval Queue (Moderate Registrations), I think our Forum is a bit too large to moderate them, seeing as we receive dozens of new users daily.

quote:

Entering XXX.XXX.80 would ban all IPs in the range of XXX.XXX.80.1 - XXX.XXX.80.254.

That sounds good.
Let me try that and see if it does the trick.

Once again, thanks again for your help.
If I have anymore problems I'll let you know

Regards

Chris (Bitebug2003)

Dear Chris...

There're lotsa reasons for a change in IP, not all of them being changing ISPs for soley malicious reasons.

In December 2004, she ("Cretin") may have been at home on Mom & Dad's computer... bored & cranky and up for some mischief.

In May 2005, Cretin may have been online via a wireless hub or college server... again, bored & cranky and now with the "mission" to make your life miserable.

Or vice versa.

Do you not require email verification upon registration? If not, whhhhhhhhy not?? My community would implode if I didn't require separate and discrete email addresses for every registration.

Also, by requiring discrete email addys for each registration it's easier to slow down/halt the mass registration "thang" by suspending --not deleting-- the Cretin's privileges. When a Cretin tries to register using an "in use" email addy, they'll be denied registration even before you have to intervene, and at some point the Cretin will tire of creating/maintaining all those email accounts.

Banning by IP is, IMO, problematic as you wind up banning anyone & everyone who might ever use that IP range... this could ban whole neighborhoods, college dorms, chunks of IPS subscribers, wireless hub users (I can just hear the roar of the Starbuck #1517 crowd as they can't get to you... LOL!), etc.

My advice? Target the individual, not the IP.