Has anyone noticed that a bunch of members have been joining whose usernames and information are random letters? For instance, look up the members who have joined today:

|Username| |Location| |Joined| |Posts|
1 Lpfxuebl Nivazohf 23 Jun 2007 0
2 Dlifdifc Qugosoom 23 Jun 2007 0
3 Jtnktnzx Yelegehi 23 Jun 2007 0
4 Mnxyoxyh Koqediaq 23 Jun 2007 0
5 Dkmucaxy Geiboqup 23 Jun 2007 0
6 Ninniach 23 Jun 2007 0
7 Euazcfzt Dusewayu 23 Jun 2007 0
8 Medsanila Germany 23 Jun 2007 0
9 paydayloan USA 23 Jun 2007 0
10 Ojocptxx Zbzogewo 23 Jun 2007 0
11 Gesuaglp Mizafeyu 23 Jun 2007 0
12 donzuanchi USA 23 Jun 2007 0
13 Ruuenxbi Sejtuqab 23 Jun 2007 0
14 seren92 23 Jun 2007 0
15 Drjijyag Defejaci 23 Jun 2007 0
16 Xbolduqo Cihufigi 23 Jun 2007 0
17 Gqhvlrnf Xicojiwa 23 Jun 2007 0
18 Jeqifehp Cimonogi 23 Jun 2007 0
19 Dtqyyrer Kularila 23 Jun 2007 0

Nearly all of them are nonsense! It's a little bit scary, because the only reason I can think of to explain this is because these people want to see the "Your Life" section and the rest of our personal information. Why are these people being approved?

Perhaps I'm being paranoid, but I'd like to know whether some fifty year old stalker is reading about my personal life.

_________________

Yay, I wasn't the only one that noticed! Well, I don't think Arwen or the mods are approving them, just after you submit your "application" it automatically says you've registered.

What I mean is, lets say I fill out my "application" and hit submit. It'd show my name at the bottom as the last registered member.. but who ever approves them really hasn't approved me yet.. I'm registered, but inactive.

Thats what I think at least... if that made any sense..

It is aggrivating though.. to see all of these inactive members with gibberish names and locations.




To me, that seems normal. Seren92 seems like a normal name. Not sure though, I could be wrong.

I had the same viewpost as Meldarion, that is why there is the activation system.

PayDayLoan? That sounds like a spammer.

_________________
<center>

_________________




^ By me and my SS *squiggle hugs*

Well, obviously it's pretty new, but when I registered, it took a few days before I was actually able to log in. The your life section requires you to enter your user name and password, and if the mods haven't activated your account, and you try to log in, it will say something like:

Your account is Inactive, or you have entered the wrong user name and password combination.

What I mean is if I were to register as Sfksdlfjk, and the mods haven't activated my account, then if I try to log in as Sfksdlfjk to even view the Your Life section, it won't let me.. it will say something like what I typed above.. So.. inactive members can't even view the your life sections.. and those gibberish names will never be activated (let's hope).'


I'm scared that someone will make a valid form that seems like a nice person, and then take advantage of the your life section without posting or anything.

Ah, well, it's good to know that these people aren't approved. I had assumed that only people who were approved were added to the memberlist.

It is scary to think someone pretend to be nice while taking advantage of the "Life" section, but no one can fully prevent that, unfortunately.

Though if these people had registered under "Arwen_is_cool7" or something it wouldn't be nearly as obvious. So what if we had only members who had posted once or twice be able to view the life section? Most real members are going to introduce themselves on the Introduction Board, or start in the LotR sections first, I think.

_________________

Yeah, I'm relieved very much. I remember after I registered, it showed my name down there, but I couldn't log in and post my introduction for a day or so.


Very good point. Most of the time if you see someone with 1 or 2 posts in the Your Life section, that's a bit odd. Especially if they're judging pictures and looking at the where do you live thing. Then I'd be very afraid.

I was just looking around at some old posts from the people with 1000+ posts, and most people it looks like did go straight to an introduction, and then graphics, misc. randomness, and lotr related things. Some even went into RP and stuff.

I hope that the Mods are able to spot spammers, but other than that, online interactions require a trust system. Someone with bad intentions could easily log on with an elvish name like the rest of us. So we just all need to have basic caution, I think.

_________________
<center> all we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us


Thank you for five-plus wonderful years of obsession, friendship and fun

^ Yes, but we should still do what we can to prevent what's happening now...
(If you're confused about what I'm referring to, good! That means the mods will have taken care of it before too many people see it... )

_________________

Spammers are buging me so much posting the violated material in a lot of forums. There should be control mechanism set by mods before those members get approved.

_________________


Will be going to London on March of the 30th

Okay, time to see into the moddie world a bit

Yes, all newly registered users' names are listed at the bottom of the main forum page, regardless of whether they've been approved or not

Yes, all through the year we've been getting spam accounts (that's why the activation)

No, even if you can see the name they can't necessarily post; it takes a mod to go into the control panel, find a list of inactive users, and sort through one by one either activate or delete

and

Usually it's clear-cut to delete, but from what happened with Gothik not always--there are signs

We always notice an increase on weekends, and during holidays like summertime

By the end of this morning alone, there will probably be at least 2 entire pages of them.

It's a lot of work!

_________________
Starting October 13th: globe trotting from my kitchen. Follow along on Cook In Fifty-Two

_________________




^ By me and my SS *squiggle hugs*

Oh, yes, of course! I'm very grateful that the mods do whatever they can to keep A-U safe and spam free. It seems like quite a daunting task.

_________________
<center> all we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us


Thank you for five-plus wonderful years of obsession, friendship and fun

It's good to have a mod clear all this up! I don't blame you guys for Gothik, but it really shocked and disturbed me to click into a thread and find things like that. I'm surprised he didn't hit the life section...

I'm thankful, though, because if it weren't for our mods sorting through all new members it would have happened much sooner and much more frequently!

_________________

I agree with everyone - it is scary... who knows who could be grabbing your picture off the Picture Thread and doing things with it!

I have noticed a lot of these sorts of names; it's like someone just randomly started banging around on the keyboard. Maybe all of them aren't stalkers, but I'm scared. The last thing I want is someone coming to my house or something in the middle of the night...

And I do want to share pictures and stuff with the other "Real" members, but it's hard when who knows who could be viewing this stuff.

The Picture Thread is in the "Your Life" board. Nobody can see your pictures unless they are an official member here; that one board cannot be viewed by those who are not signed in... everything in that board is very safe from any guests, so you need not worry. Arweb saw to that ages ago.

_________________