A question regarding spambot.

[Vindekarr]

Just a quick question-I've noticed a lot of spambots lately having been posting in really low-traffic parts of the site. It strikes me as like putting a billboard facing back to front on a one-way street, why do they do that? and their ability to speak seems to be degenerating aswell? does this mean we're hurting them and they're starting to fall apart? or are their masters just crap at this? And just how does a SPAMBOT work? are they autonomous? a program?

 

Sure they're hugely annoying, and a pain in the ass, but the idea of a program that can rove around the web intrigues me, as a writer.

[bben46]

A lot of the spambots we have been getting lately seem to be sleeper type - a real person signs up at a bunch of sites and is paid a few cents per site. The spam company takes those accounts and uses their spambot to place the spam. An alert member sees the spam and reports it within minutes and a staff member bans it - so, a net loss to the spammer of a few cents but in return they get a few eyeballs on their trash - hopefully very few.

 

Never - NEVER click on a spam advertisement the best result is the spammer sees that someone is looking at their trash, thus encourageing them to keep doing it. The worst is a drive by virus install just from clicking. :wallbash:

[ub3rman123]

I think that their reason for posting in the more out of the way sections of the forums is because they're programmed to seek stuff with at least a passing similarity to what spam they have to drop off. Therefore, they're more likely to post spam about a new car sale on a topic about cars than the more traveled forums about Skyrim.