Mass Deleting Applicants

bengreenfield

Spambots have been after my forum, and I have literally THOUSANDS of applicants. Any way to mass delete them, and then prevent this from occurring in the future?

UnderDog

The spambots have a certain role in your database, probably "applicant"
Check the IP or something else of your applicants. Maybe they have something in common.
What you want to do is
Delete from users where role = "applicant" BUT you do not want to delete the REAL applicants, so you want to find something that the spammers have in common.

jeremiah6

Or you can just go into the database and delete them there

phreak

Same for me, but i think it should be a default functionality for batch delete users. I have a bout 10 spam-bot registrations every day. They don't know how to post in the forum but to but still they are posting links and comments active on the activity wall.

bobtheman

i second the request

johoney

third this request.

UnderDog

Delete * from users where (find something the spammers have in common)
It's that easy.
If you want it as a feature functionality, post a feature request on gitHub
If you want it as a plugin, make a plugin.

oliverraduner

In my case, there is no "role" column in the user table based on which I could remove my Spam-Applicants. Anyway, I figured out that every User with UserID > 55 was a fake applicant. I used the following two MySQL statements to clean them up directly in the database:

DELETE FROM GDN_User WHERE UserID > 55;
DELETE FROM GDN_UserRole WHERE UserID > 55;

Worked perfectly. Cheers

peregrine

@bengreenfield

@UnderDog said:
The spambots have a certain role in your database, probably "applicant"
Check the IP or something else of your applicants. Maybe they have something in common.
What you want to do is
Delete from users where role = "applicant" BUT you do not want to delete the REAL applicants, so you want to find something that the spammers have in common.

check out.
http://vanillaforums.org/addon/cleanser-plugin

Chiprang

Used this Cleanser plugin but it deleted even real applicants. @pereggrine, can we have some thing that enables the admin to mass select the applicants with a radio button with a delete feature? I'm sure..that plugin or add-on would be a smash hit

hgtonight

@Chiprang In the applicants page, you can click on the column title Action to automatically select all the check boxes.

I really need to get that plugin tested and published.

peregrine

@Chiprang said:
Used this Cleanser plugin but it deleted even real applicants. pereggrine, can we have some thing that enables the admin to mass select the applicants with a radio button with a delete feature? I'm sure..that plugin or add-on would be a smash hit

thats why I wrote instructions on how to use the plugin. And thats why you have a file you can edit to remove who you don't want to delete from the list.

If you start messing with checkboxes, you will have the same problem that is already in the dashboard, when you try to delete 10,000 users via individual checkboxes.

The key is to maintain your site instead of being an absentee landlord and waiting for 10000 spammers and to install the botstop plugin, and then you can use the dashboard applicants when there is a reasonable number.

jrtayloriv

"If you start messing with checkboxes, you will have the same problem that is already in the dashboard, when you try to delete 10,000 users via individual checkboxes."

No, it's not the same problem at all. Right now, I have to click on the link for the user's profile, wait for the profile page to load, click delete user, wait for the confirm delete dialog to load, click confirm ... I have to do this for every single spammer. With Checkboxes, I could select 50 of them at a time and click delete, with no page reload. This is much, much, much faster.

I have 80+ spammers per day applying. This is not about being an "absentee landlord". I check it every day, but it takes far too long to remove them all with the current setup. Please listen to what your users are saying -- make it where we can mass delete spam users.

peregrine

@jrtayloriv

search and you shall find....

a way to implement some better methods to reduce spam and

• • perhaps share it in this link
• http://vanillaforums.org/discussion/24785/poll-which-registration-method-and-plugins-do-you-use-to-deter-spammers-and-their-efficacy
• • if you feel it worth it. I don't have high expectations here, because no one wants to put the info in one consolidated place. They prefer to scatter it in the wind for optimal search capabilities.

you can mass delete with bulkedit plugin.

I have 80+ spammers per day applying.

I suggest you use botstop and this plugin if you are using approval

http://vanillaforums.org/addon/1139/registration-restrict-logger

other people have other suggestions - use what you feel you want to use.

If none of the solutions work for you, If you want to write yourself a custom plugin or you could possibly hire someone, i suggest x00 as the developer and just propose a pledge amount. Or look on elance and hire someone.

peregrine

@jrtayloriv said:

peregrine said: "If you start messing with checkboxes, you will have the same problem that is already in the dashboard, when you try to delete 10,000 users via individual checkboxes."

No, it's not the same problem at all

wait till you have 10,000 spam applicants let me know how checkboxes works for you.

---

also here is a bulk editor by hgtonight that people seem to like.

http://vanillaforums.org/addon/bulkedit-plugin