not allowing comments

Do you have any plugins that control commenting? Does your theme?

Above should work, unless a plugin/theme is in control.

I found one plugin called WordPress Importer which says it “Import posts, pages, comments, custom fields, categories, tags and more from a WordPress export file.”

I don’t think that’s it though.

It would not be.

Linking us to your site may help us see an issue.

they would reduce cost of my repair by 50%.

If you know the site has already been compromised, first please be clear on that and then please do not include a full URL (mysite dot com) or add // before, example:

//https://mysite.com

(removes the link here).

The site does not have any viruses or anything like that… it’s just that it has been spammed with comments. The site is: https://www.petemundo.com

Here is the last note from my host on what I can do to reduce cost: As for the comments issue, I actually went in there initially and tried to delete all of the spam messages but half way through the 3000 comments my window froze up as well. One of the spam comments on that page is causing browsers to crash, so the only way to remove it is to have a developer run a database script to delete all comments from there.

Even if you got this spam plugin installed, I’m not sure if it will create enough trust with our IT Engineers to remove the mail block on the server. It’s quite expensive to have a server blacklisted multiple times, so they would rather we fix the spam issue so we know for sure its going to work on the server side.

If you are able turn off commenting completely and add a captcha to your contact form, then I could reduce the cost of the estimate by 50%. Then our team could go in and remove the rest of the spam comments and update the server to allow mail again. From there, we’ll send a test message to verify and all should be good. Or we could do it all for the original estimate we sent out.

A good WordPress host would know they can simply run MySQL:

delete from wp_comments where comment_approved = 'spam';

Using phpMyAdmin after a full DB backup, of course. Takes like 2 minutes, if that.

The issue with deleting 3000 Spam comments at once is most likely the script ‘times out’.

They could also temporarily adjust that if needed.

As for the issue with comment settings:

1. You are running WP3.5.2 which is quite outdated and not secure.
2. A site rebuild may well be the right thing to do here, but since above seems to not be known by current host, you may want to find a better one.

The host probably knows that and is just charging me for unnecessary time to make a few bucks. I hate it and I know they are trying to rip of me off, but that’s why I’m trying to do as much as I can so the cost is lower. I will have to use them for some of this as they said “It looks like our IT Department turned email notifications off for your website at the server level as the sheer volume of spam was getting our servers blacklisted and that is no good. They informed me that they cannot turn that feature back on until the spam issue is resolved.”

To disable comments can I just add a disable comments plugin?

I can’t really afford a site rebuild and my site is pretty basic for professional reasons, so it that necessary?

Thank you!
Pete

Pete,

Do you Tweet often?

You seem to have a Twitter Plugin of some sort? Can you deactivate it?

Lines 23 – 27 Source of HomePage =

/* <![CDATA[ */
var wdtf_loader_options = {"src":"http:\/\/petemundo.com\/wp-admin\/admin-ajax.php?action=twitterCallback","minWidth":"220","minHeight":"250"};
/* ]]> */
</script>
<script type='text/javascript' src='https://petemundo.com/wp-content/plugins/wd-twitter-feed/loader.js?ver=3.5.2'></script>

just did that…. what’s next? ??

Let me check site…and btw, you seem to be double posting.

https://www.ads-software.com/support/topic/not-allowing-comments-4?replies=5#post-6984735

Try again to stop comments as you noted above.

Yes I posted here and in miscellaneous because I have posted in this group before and never got an answer, so I posted both places to see which one I might get a response on. I apologize if that is not kosher and I will most certainly stop.
Thank you!
Pete

I just tried… did not work with either all posts or settings… :-/

Step 2: Deactivate ALL plugins one at a time. After each one is deactivated, try to stop comments.

Note: I suggest you clear your browser cache, and insure your local machine is not the issue.

I have deactivated every plug in… and it still wouldn’t disable comments. What if I added a disable comments plugin?

I cleared cache and browser history before trying plugins and that too did not work…

Great. Now can you please update your site to WP4.2.2?