I installed Win7 sp1 on my PC last night after spotting it in the Windows Update list. It’s been out since 16 Feb 2011 but I’ve only just noticed! That’s the state of my PC in the screenshot.
Hitches
Everything installed really well, actually. The downloads and install took about an hour and included updates for the Microsoft Mouse I use. After the SP1 had installed, a few more “optional” updates appeared, so in they went as well! The whole thing was much better than some earlier Microsoft service pack installs on Windows XP and 95 that I’ve done!
Impressions
The PC actually feels as if it’s running better. More stable, nicer window & application opening.
Windows 7 Ultimate Install To say that I’m seriously impressed is an understatement! Having an MSDN subscription confers certain benefits, but for most Microsoft stuff that I have to use, it’s usually an exercise in teeth-gritting somewhere from the banal to the infuriating as I plod on through. My personal experience of Vista comes into...
Introduction These shots are primarily for the benefit of my friend. Virtual Box Sun’s (now Oracle’s) VirtualBox application allows computer users to run a variety of Operating Systems (OS) on virtually any computer operating system. This is the VirtualBox homepage. For example: Windows XP on Mac Solaris on Windows XP Windows 7 32-bit on Windows...
The plague of all blogs is spam, mainly comment spam, by sheer numerical superiority.
Q. Why Do They Do It?
A. As a minimum, they do it to open a back-door into your blog that allows the perpetrator to place reverse linkages to another website to increase that website’s visibility in search engine results (so called “Search Engine Optimisation” – SEO ). This back-linkage they use to increase website search hits, which they can charge an ignorant website beginner big money for.
At the worst, the culprit would gain full access to the blog allowing free posting and deletions or even the complete removal of your website content.
Today’s Example
Today, I got a comment that made me check further as notionally, it looked okay-ish. These are the details (click image for full-size view of the comment as it appears in the WordPress admin section):
Comment Spam Example
The Jacksonville lawyer is in Florida and has this website; http://www.divorceyes.com/index.html, and the actual comment is pretty kosher, although brief, saying;
Strangely you have made an awesome post and i appreciate your work and keep it up. Thanks for sharing this with us.
This is all very nice, but check out the IP address….
WHOIS 113.203.135.140
By checking the WHOIS for this, we see that the IP Address for this supposedly reputable Florida lawyer (Divorce Yes) is in Karachi, Pakistan! Well are they? My guess, given the cheap web costs in the USA, is that Divorce Yes is in the US and that they wouldn’t for an instant even consider anywhere else!
There isn’t a conclusion really. This is just an example of the way that text harvesting is being used to make seemingly intelligent comments slip past the comment filters on a WordPress blog.
As many of these filters rely on an IP address, if the webmaster lets a dodgy IP address through just once then it’ll be marked as “good” by the filters which will then allow the spammer to post even more comments, all for the various nefarious reasons that I mentioned first.
This is why I use a plugin like WP-SpamFree, and using it I can block all incoming pings from a given IP address, in this case, 113.203.135.140!
This isn’t a conclusion again, but my examination of alternative possibilities, but note the following:
The Divorce Yes website is made and SEO’d by http://enettechnologies.com/.
WordPress is used on the website.
Many WordPress plugins exist to “improve” the SEO of a website. (I use some!)
Some do it by ensuring meta and other data is added if it’s missing.
Others have sprung up over the last few years that “intelligently” link to other websites…. they harvest websites for text and linkages for later use, much like email spammers scan websites for email addresses to spam. [n.b. I use PHPEnkoder from Michael Greenberg to hide email addresses on this site from email address harvesters.]
It could be, although I cannot prove or disprove it, but because some of this spam I receive is now pretty readable as with this one above, that plugins are being used for much of the hits I get. This comment could be such an example, or the law website name is being used textually as a smokescreen for the Pakistani spammer. I see lots of adverts along these lines that couldn’t possibly rely on manual human link placements for their effectiveness….
I’d be interested to hear from Miller Law or their website designer on this one. It’s not the first time that I’ve had reputable businesses appear on my website like this and I’d like to know what it appears like at their end, if at all. It does make me wonder if this very website is being used to cloak spam at other websites in the same manner.
This is why I’ve left all URL back-links to the parties in place so that they’ll see them in their logs.
Weird Comment Spam I don’t know if it’s linked, or not, but since the WP upgrade a few days ago I’ve had an extra type of comment spam fall into my spam filters. Thankfully the spam filters worked, but still filled up the “spam comment” area for further perusal. Maybe it’s a plugin? Whatever. Dodgy...
Introduction I knew there was something really, really dodgy about that MyBookFace.net crap highlighted in this post the other day. Not only are they connected to some serious malware (as detailed in the posting), but they’ve an interesting line in popups!!! Google Treasure Chest Rises Yet Again! Here’s what to do… Go to http://mybookface.net making...
Many a time you and your UNIT chums saved the world from horrible alien monsters. It wasn’t always “The Doctor” and your calm panic and belief in the Doctor’s powers (despite himself) always pulled us through. You acted with just the right amount of authority. Saturday tea-times were never the same once you “retired” and Doctor Who was pulled from the schedules….
It’s grief innit? Consider this. You care for someone dearly and they get ill and go on a life support machine. Now you are not a doctor and don’t know how the life support machine works. Occasionally, the patient wakes up, says strange things, and then goes back into a coma on the life support...
Crikey! I Never Realised! Maybe certain days have relevance above their station and mere numerical nomenclature? Who knows. So read on. See what happened today! 622 AD – The Hijra of Muhammad Muhammad runs away from Mecca to escape persecution. From this point forward, huge swathes of the globe took up Islam, Islamic empires spread...
Four views of comet Tempel 1 as the Stardust spacecraft swept past.
The absolute ingenuity of us humans and how far we have come since our cave-dwelling days is supremely demonstrated by the return of pictures by the spacecraft, Stardust.
In this case, 12 years ago, Stardust was launched to look at an asteroid then collect samples from the dust of a comet, Wild 2. It did all of this wonderfully.
Then, in the meantime, another spacecraft, Deep Impact, had been launched which crashed a small craft into another comet, Tempel, back in 2005, creating a crater.
The fantastic demonstration of our technical expertise is that almost on a whim, it was decided to get the first craft, Stardust, to have a look at this crater and beam the picture back to us – and it did all of this automatically, 336 million km from Earth, which a radio signal takes 18 minutes to travel!
Evidence of the crater: Left shows a Deep Impact photo from 2005; Right shows Stardust's image with a small extra crater.
Our Reluctance to Depart from our Hunter-gatherer Past
Dead Minke On the Nisshin Maru "research factory ship"
Some people still hunt for sport. Some nations dress hunting up with weasel words and hide their blood-lust behind the veil of science. Such a nation is Japan which kills whales for “scientific research” (900-odd this year) yet openly reveals this research as a fraud with with the real goals of short-term monetary gain and blood lust .
Whale for Sale: Sales of whalemeat have fallen, despite promotion
Here we see an advert for the “research” results.
mmm yummy.
It’s a desperate thing to see this because the Japanese claim that there lots of whales to eat – which was exactly what was said about the blue whale, right whale etc, all of which are now rarities of the ocean when once, they were plentiful.
It’s now being revealed by real research, that the more diverse an ecosystem is (and we live in one, you know), the more chance we will have of surviving all manner of disasters – disease, drought, climate change etc.
Thank Goodness For Bravery
Whalers clash with Conservationists
So we should all thank the people from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society who have peacefully risked their lives “for the bigger picture”.
It’s another aspect of humanity revealed to me today, in the news.
Bravery & Courage.
Ady Gil and Shonan Maru 2 confrontation
The whalers say constant harassment has forced them to suspend operations – well dah!
That’s the definition of bravery, as seen in these dramatic shots.
This week, I’ve become aware of three excellent initiatives that are focussing people’s energies, creativity, and cash(!) into positive solutions to the global energy crisis. It just shows what can be done – and these projects are not difficult or hard to creative creatures like ourselves. Big Mirrors in the Desert This is a $400billion...
Hell I agree with Leo Laporte that “MySpace is the new hell”. It’s just crap. 100 million people struggling for stuff just out of reach that’s never gonna happen. (see See http://www.twit.tv/natn28) Hieronymus Bosch‘s version is close but the Buddhist concept of “The Hell of Incessant Suffering” is better. Quote: It is because people are...
The Civil Service Rank and File Network have called a rally outside the PCS conference this week to demand action from the union on the vicious benefit sanctioning regime. Benefit sanctions are set to become a huge issue for public … Continue reading → […]
The Information Tribunal ordered the DWP to name the companies and charities involved in workfare at an appeal hearing this work. A long running war of words has been waging between the DWP and the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) ever … Continue reading → […]
How WordPress Spam Works
Posted in Internet Tags:Alternative , BLOCK , Comment Spam , Contact , Court , data , dodgy , Email , engine , filter , Florida , God , good , Human , IP address , Jeff , Last Updated , LAW , Lawyer , Mad , money , name , NOTE , Pacific , Pacific Webworks , Pakistan , Plugin , PLUGINS , POST , PROVE , PWW , Registrant , SEO , smokescreen , social networking , Spam , United States , URL , USA , weasel , WebWorks , whois , WordPress , YEARS
WordPress Comment Spam
Q. Why Do They Do It?
A. As a minimum, they do it to open a back-door into your blog that allows the perpetrator to place reverse linkages to another website to increase that website’s visibility in search engine results (so called “Search Engine Optimisation” – SEO ). This back-linkage they use to increase website search hits, which they can charge an ignorant website beginner big money for.
At the worst, the culprit would gain full access to the blog allowing free posting and deletions or even the complete removal of your website content.
Today’s Example
Today, I got a comment that made me check further as notionally, it looked okay-ish. These are the details (click image for full-size view of the comment as it appears in the WordPress admin section):
Comment Spam Example
The Jacksonville lawyer is in Florida and has this website; http://www.divorceyes.com/index.html, and the actual comment is pretty kosher, although brief, saying;
This is all very nice, but check out the IP address….
WHOIS 113.203.135.140
By checking the WHOIS for this, we see that the IP Address for this supposedly reputable Florida lawyer (Divorce Yes) is in Karachi, Pakistan! Well are they? My guess, given the cheap web costs in the USA, is that Divorce Yes is in the US and that they wouldn’t for an instant even consider anywhere else!
And so it is! The actual WHOIS for Divorce Yes is in Florida! (The actual WHOIS for the web-hosting, fortehosting.com is in Illinois). The registrant’s name (Miller) also agrees with the Divorce Yes’s contact details here, but note; the email address in the comment, [email protected], is not the same as the email address on the contact page, which is [email protected]
Conclusion
There isn’t a conclusion really. This is just an example of the way that text harvesting is being used to make seemingly intelligent comments slip past the comment filters on a WordPress blog.
As many of these filters rely on an IP address, if the webmaster lets a dodgy IP address through just once then it’ll be marked as “good” by the filters which will then allow the spammer to post even more comments, all for the various nefarious reasons that I mentioned first.
This is why I use a plugin like WP-SpamFree, and using it I can block all incoming pings from a given IP address, in this case, 113.203.135.140!
For interest, I’ve edited out the back-link from the spam comment above and you can find it on this post, Pacific Webworks, Lawyers and Social Networking, here.
Alternative Conclusion
This isn’t a conclusion again, but my examination of alternative possibilities, but note the following:
It could be, although I cannot prove or disprove it, but because some of this spam I receive is now pretty readable as with this one above, that plugins are being used for much of the hits I get. This comment could be such an example, or the law website name is being used textually as a smokescreen for the Pakistani spammer. I see lots of adverts along these lines that couldn’t possibly rely on manual human link placements for their effectiveness….
I’d be interested to hear from Miller Law or their website designer on this one. It’s not the first time that I’ve had reputable businesses appear on my website like this and I’d like to know what it appears like at their end, if at all. It does make me wonder if this very website is being used to cloak spam at other websites in the same manner.
This is why I’ve left all URL back-links to the parties in place so that they’ll see them in their logs.
Related posts:
Weird Comment Spam I don’t know if it’s linked, or not, but since the WP upgrade a few days ago I’ve had an extra type of comment spam fall into my spam filters. Thankfully the spam filters worked, but still filled up the “spam comment” area for further perusal. Maybe it’s a plugin? Whatever. Dodgy...
Introduction I knew there was something really, really dodgy about that MyBookFace.net crap highlighted in this post the other day. Not only are they connected to some serious malware (as detailed in the posting), but they’ve an interesting line in popups!!! Google Treasure Chest Rises Yet Again! Here’s what to do… Go to http://mybookface.net making...