Subscription spam

  • My blog has Akismet installed so comment spam is dealt with well. I use Subscribe to Comments Reloaded to allow subscription to comments, but for a while now email messages sent to confirm subscription generate “Mail Delivery Failed” emails, which clog up my Inbox.

    Is there any recommended way to deal with this? Some of my thoughts include:

    1. Can Akismet be set to deal with subscription spam so the subscription emails never get sent out in the first place?
    2. If subscriptions could only be set up at the same time as a comment is accepted, thus allowing Akismet to do its job and thus prevent the subscription email also?
    3. Are there recommended Captchas or other ways to prevent subscription spam?

    Or is there some other way that everyone uses?

    Thanks for any help.

    • This topic was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Jan Dembowski. Reason: Moved to Fixing WordPress, this is not an Everything else WordPress topic

    The page I need help with: [log in to see the link]

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  • A couple of ideas…

    You could set up an email filter in your inbox to archive “Mail Delivery Failed” emails automatically so you don’t have to manually deal with them.

    Capthas and honeypots help.

    Also do a search for “WordPress verify email plugins,” and you’ll find some options like this.

    Thread Starter unklee

    (@unklee)

    Thanks for those thoughts.

    1. Yes, using a Captcha may be the best first step. It nips the problem in the bud right at the start, if the spambots haven’t found a way around it. Subscribe to Comments Reloaded has this option, so I should try it at least. (I have been reluctant because it just adds to the “weight” of the website and discourages commenters, but it looks like I have no choice.)

    2. The email filter would only help if I could adequately identify “Mail Delivery Failed” emails from spambots and then trash those emails. Perhaps I can do that, but I don’t want to trash other emails.

    3. I wasn’t aware of “verify email” plugins but ti looks like they check the subscription list, but my problem occurs before they get onto the list.

    4. Of course another option is to remove the “subscribe to comments” option altogether, and just let people keep coming back to check, but that cure seems almost as bad as the disease.

    So thanks for your help. It has taken me a little while, and this discussion, to get my head around the problem. I’ll now be able to work on it better.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)
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