How to protect your website against spam?
As a website or e-commerce site owner, you have probably already experienced spam, automatically generated content, in comments or threads.
Some spammers abuse websites owned by others by creating misleading content and links in order to drive more traffic to their own sites.
Examples of spam in comments
This type of content is not harmless and can even be harmful. In addition to disturbing the visitors on your website, it indicates to Google and other search engines that undesirable content is associated with it.
Comments and discussions on forums are an excellent source of information and an effective way to engage users of your site. This valuable content should not be polluted and buried under layers of auto-generated keywords and other links posted by spammers.
How to deal with this type of spam? 8 user anti-spam tips
Don’t panic, solutions exist to protect the forums, threads and comments of your Magento website or e-commerce and make them unattractive to spammers.
Keep your forum software updated and corrected
Take the time to update your software and pay special attention to important security updates. Spammers take advantage of security issues and loopholes in older versions of blogs, Magento, WordPress and other CMS.
Add a Captcha
Doesn’t that term mean anything to you? However, you must have already had to deal with them when surfing the Internet. Captchas require users to copy a slightly distorted string of signs to prove that they are a human being, not an automated computer program.
Example of Captcha to detect a robot
Block suspicious behavior
Many forum platforms allow you to set time limits between posts. On WordPress, you can install a plug-in to act as a spam filter, but also extensions that detect excessive traffic from proxies or individual IP addresses and other suspicious activity typical of bots.
The same thing is possible on Magento thanks to the installation of anti-spam modules. These extensions identify and block spammers by analyzing contact form entries and product reviews before displaying them on your e-commerce site.
Check the most active users on a daily basis
If someone has recently joined your user community and is posting an excessive amount of messages, it’s a good idea to review their profile to ensure that their messages and comments are not spammy.
Disable certain types of comments
In the case of a forum, it is advisable to close very old threads as they are unlikely to get valid responses.
If you don’t plan to monitor a post’s thread or comments and users no longer interact with it, disable it to prevent spammers from abusing it.
Making good use of the moderation features
Two moderation features can be activated on Magento or WordPress to fight against spam:
- The feature requires users to have a certain reputation before links can be displayed.
- The feature requires moderation of all comments containing links.
If possible, change your settings to not allow anonymous posts and make posts from new users require approval to become visible.
Establish blacklists of spam terms
You can block unwanted comments with a blacklist of inappropriate terms, for example related to illegal streaming or the pharmaceutical industry.
Add off-topic terms that are only used by spammers! Just get inspired by looking at the spam messages on other websites.
Some built-in features or plugins to install on your Magento or WordPress can also flag and remove comments considered as spam.
Use the “nofollow” attribute for links in comments
Adding this attribute will deter spammers from targeting your site by telling Google and other search engines not to follow the link. By default, WordPress and many blog sites automatically add the nofollow attribute to all posted comments.
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