Best Anti spambot plugin?
Hi all.
Sometime back I offered some advice on a plugin that seemed to help prevent spam almost entirely. It required a tick box to be ticked before comments could be added. It was stated that spambots didn't recognise the tick box and therefore failed in sending messages.
However, after many many months of use it seems to be useless now. It's called "Growmap) anti spambot.Has anyone else had issues with this plugin and/or can anyone suggest a reliable way to prevent spam these days?
My site health isn't what it could be because I became so tired of deleting spam that I turned comments off. This obviously isn't good for visitor engagement and I'd like to fix the issue. Any help will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
Recent Comments
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Hi and thanks for your comment. I tried both those for over a year and they just didn't cut it. So I tried GASP and it worked for about 3 months. I'm going to try the one Jay has suggested below and I'll make a comment on how it's going in a few months. Thanks again.
Hi Phil. You might remember me as the one who recommended the now useless GASP. It worked for a while and then I have no idea how it turned to crap.
I too have stopped using it and can't stand Akismet either. I guess the people who have no issues with Akismet are also using captcha. I don't like captcha either.
I'm now using a plugin called WP-Spamshield. You just install and activate it and it works in the background to get rid of spam. No check boxes, no captchas and best of all it keeps your spam folder clean and lets legitimate comments through.
I've been using it since August and so far I've had no problems at all with it. Give it a try and see if it works for you.
Hi there Jay. It's a shame that GASP stopped working and I too dislike both Akismet and Captcha so I'll try what you've suggested. Thanks very much for the heads up again on this one and I'll let you know how I go. I appreciate your help.
Okay Jay. I've just installed the plugin and fingers crossed. I also set up a contact form. I'll keep you posted on how it goes on my site. Thanks again.
Hi Jay. 10 days down the track and haven't had 1 spam message. Lets hope it stays that way. Thanks again for your help.
Phil.
Hi there Jay.
About 40 days now and still not no spam. Seems to be working well and hope it continues. Thanks again for the recommendation and I'll keep updating you. Regards, Phil.
Hi Jay.
Over 4 months now and not ONE spam message. This new plugin is working just great (so far) thankyou! Any objections to me making a movie to show others like before? All credit will given to you of course.
Phil.
This is great! Tried and tested methods always get the thumbs up! Well done for keeping us informed Phil. Thank you!
I use the Aksimet plugin with the Comments set so that I have to approve them before they are posted.
Akismet catches virtually all Spam and any that does slip through doesn't go onto the site as I have to manually approve them - which only takes a minute, so no hassle. My main site gets around 800 - 1,000 spam comments a week, all except 3-4 are automatically blocked by Akismet - which is pretty impressive. Those 3-4 are then held in a queue awaiting my approval ( or not ) they dont go onto the site.
Only downside is that the commenter doesn't see their comment live on your site until you have approved it. But not an issue, just needs a note saying that to ensure the site is Spam free you manually approve all comments.
Thanks so much for your reply. I've been down the Akismet path and the issue is the spam that gets past Akismet and others. It takes so much time to manage and "delete" the rubbish it's seems to me better to turn it off. However, thanks to your comments I'll try Akismet again because it's been about 12 months since I used it.
Thanks again.
It's definitively better than it used to be. Stats from the new dashboard on my site:
6 MONTHS SPAM BLOCKED 173,301
ALL TIME 367,266
SPAM BLOCKED ACCURACY 99.90%
( 333 MISSED SPAM, 2 FALSE POSITIVES )
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Ey there Phil... haven't seen ya' around for a while... possibly due to be pretty non-observant! )-;
I just use the standard Akismet also. Around three months ago, it started allowing a bunch of junk to get through on two of my websites. But I think I did an update or something and after about a month of activating Si Captcha everything returned to normal and I could deactivate Si Captcha again.
Hope yours gets straightened out... I really don't like Captcha but I hate spam even more!!!
Randy
Hi Randy... how you going matey! Yeh still around plugging away on one of my sites - a lot. This little set back has slowed traffic because I had to turn off comments. I'm going to try what Jay has suggested below and see how it goes. If it works I'll post here and let everyone know how it went.
Cheers to you for the post.
Phil.