Spammer styles: feel the love
I’ve got various kinds of spam blockers on this blog. They don’t work perfectly. but if they didn’t work at all, I’d have hundreds of spam comments here a day. As it is, there are probably fifteen or so, which I remove almost as soon as they come in.
It’s been interesting to watch the evolution of the spammers. Like the replicates of science fiction, over time they’ve become more and more like real commenters—at least, they become better at mimicking what they think real commenters sound like.
Still, they’re not all that good. It’s easy to tell a spam comment from a real one because the former come in waves, repeat, often have odd syntax and grammar (non-native English speakers?), and tend to be posted on old threads.
And, of course, the websites they list in connection with their comments are always advertising something: sex, drugs, (no rock and roll). Instead of rock and roll we have gambling and, of all things, lots of garden equipment.
I thought I’d share a few spam comments with you so you could appreciate, as I do, their style and variety.
First there are the sycophants. They figure we bloggers are suckers for praise; perhaps they’re right:
I love your site. They really look very nice. The articles provided are long enough to provide great content but not so long as to be totally engrossing, if you know what I mean”¦.
Just wanted to drop a note to let you know what a great site you have. It is a great resource and a great place to drop by”¦.
Your blog posts are insightful. I will take them into deep thought and consideration. Your point of view is very smart and intellectual. Charlie”¦
Suzy told me you wrote nicely, I am glad I visited this page now”¦.
Just stopped to say hello. I like your blog and it came from your heart. Beautiful!”¦
If only all articles were written equal”¦ then all would be written like this. Thanks!
Some try to seem more “real” by showing further complexity of personality and style. Many use a sort of reverse psychology—criticism or even outright disagreement:
Sorry, it just sounds like a crazy idea for me :)”¦
I do not 100% agree with you but i have your site bookmarked anyway because i want to learn more about other people and thier view on this.
Then there’s playing dumb:
I couldn’t understand some parts of this article, but it sounds interesting”¦
Some of the chattiest are those advertising garden products. They indulge in a sort of garden-bonding:
I rarely bookmark gardening blog, but I do bookmark this one – there\’s been something interesting and useful in here I\’ve picked up”¦.
Have you seen the new garden fountains?
More comraderie and blather, not connected with gardens this time:
Amazingly I was only writing a similar post to my blog this morning.. great minds think alike ;-)”¦
I didn\’t officially sign up for the blogging month, because I realized it was happening too late. Still I blogged right along with you and really enjoyed reading your daily posts. I hope they don\’t become too infrequent from here on out”¦.
I just recently came across your site, and I have to say I am thrilled I found it. I’ve been journaling since I learned to write—which means my first journal entry read something like, “Today nap time came early,” and I love finding new blogs to fo”¦
Thank you for your great post, I am doing a study on this subject and I am glad that there are sites like this to find informations very easy …”¦
This is the first time I went to a blog- very exciting – and I didn\’trealize they had these little boxes to write in- very cute. And I accidentally signed up to have a blog so you are inspiring me in two areas. Keep going, nice work! Hope your signi”¦
I just came upon this website via the blogging baby website. Interesting post. This could have easily been written by me (with just a change or two). Funny to read another\’s story that is so similar to my own”¦.
I’m not so sure I feel the same sort of connection to the spammers as they seem to feel to me. But give them time; they’re working on it, they’re working on it.
[ADDENDUM: Here’s a nice example of the genre, hot off the press, just came in today:
I think there is more a sense of gardening as stewardship, rather than an extension of home decorating prevalent in many gardening blogs”¦.]
Hilarious. I am not a spambot. Thanks.
I really wish there were some button we could each push to activate the program to send about a million “Fuckoffs” their way every time they drop this crap into our mailboxes.
The real solution is to have an American Empire thst spans the globe, creating a united earth, so that economic opportunity will give spammers some more lucrative avenues of revenue.
And I think it’s evilution, not evolution. OKTHXBYE!
I’m not a native English-speaker. Not a spambot. But I’d love me some garden equipment…as soon as I get a garden!
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“Fractional distillation machinery”
Sounds great! My still is getting old, and the corn mash just doesn’t have the same bite as is used to.
You’re getting a better grade of comment spam than TheDailyBrief gets…. Can we do a deal? I’ll swap all the pharma-spam which comes in several shades of gibberish, the pay-day loans and used car offers for the gardening spam.
I’d throw in the p0*n spam, also… but frankly I think the spam-market is pretty well swamped with the stuff,
Pingback:Spambots: Evolution in Action « Sake White
Well, I somehow ended all that foolishness on Blogger a while back and don’t know how….but guess I’ll know I’ve arrived when I start getting more of this awful stuff in my comments section again.
Thanks for posting this though.
Thank you for that thoughtful and insightful post. I cant tell you how rare it is to come across such thoughtfulness these days, and what a joy it has been to wake up to a knew understanding of an issue that other wise gets skance notice.
Like Nuclear energy for an example. Clean, efficient nuclear energy. Generated by Americas modern powerful Nuclear reactors.
You see, water is heated by the reactor where it produces steam….
When we switched to movable type and all I got was ‘master penis’, we installed MTCommentChallenge and as long as I change the challenge question about once a month, we now get ZERO comment spam.
What? No Nigerian princesses crying for help and a gift of $10 million (so long as you give them your bank account)?
And what about body enhancement? I got rid of my hotmail account because a majority of my emails were about breast enlargement…… Kinda pointless for a guy, but who said bots were smart?
I get Nigerian probate lawyers who want me to be some dead rich guy’s distant relative.
ChrisG and Lee: This post is about spam comments on the blog, not spam email. A different kettle of Phish.
Neo…. Kettle of Phish…. lol
I would not doubt there is some ‘genius’ who is trying even now to figure out how to insert these bots into spam comments. I think I even saw a few a while ago, but the amount of effort to post these 419 scams on blogs exceeds the criminal’s “work ethic”.
That said, MSM and Yahoo chat rooms are now useless because of these bots. I do not know if it is an anti-blog tactic, pathetic marketing, or another scam, but these bots really make using open sites difficult. If they get better than the software, it might cause a majority of blogs to go ‘registration only’.
Spam… Someone cue the Monty Python “Spam Vikings”!
The evolution of spam is much in parallel with the evolution of American counter-insurgency. The spam comes up with a method to overcome our security measures, and then we create a new more effective measure.
It is a constant tug of war. However, just as in war, if you find the folks producing the spam and eradicate them, the spam stops. For a time at least.
garden fountains can really make the ambiance of your garden a 100 times much better ,,