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Botspam apocalypse

memex.marginalia.nu

251–260 of 358 posts

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#251

End game: everything runs on US-owned services, and all users need to identify to be allowed to even raise a finger, so that "bad actors" can be kept out. All while we blame Russia and China, and say that their spambots and evil actions forced us to do this.

Are you suggesting that the U.S. produces a proportionally similar volume of spam traffic as Russia, China, India, Vietnam?

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#252

Really glad to see someone finally talking about this. Does anyone know what's going on with that "Duke de Montosier" spam botnet? It accounts for more than half of the botspam attacks on my sites, and I can't find anyone talking about it online anywhere, except one tweet dating back to mid-2021. It's identifiable by several short phrases that it posts: Duke de Montosier for Countess Louise of Savoy Testaru. Best kno…

I assume it’s time travelers trying to post enough so their message persists.

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#253

I work in this space at a company you've heard of - even at our scale and with our resources the proportionally larger attack incentives mean we are constantly firefighting. > The other alternatives all suck to the extent of my knowledge, they're either prohibitively convoluted, or web3 cryptocurrency micro-transaction nonsense that while sure it would work, also monetizes every single interaction in a way that is mo…

Anyone aware of any major platforms taking this approach?

The Postal Service?

Sure, there's junk mail, but imagine how much junk mail there would be if it were delivered for free. It wasn't until phone calls became so cheap as to be "unlimited" that we ended up flooded with billions of junk calls.

Microtransactions (non-crypto, thankyouverymuch) would solve a certain number of today's problems.

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#254
post #53
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing. Once this sort of fingerprinting becomes common the common bot frameworks will bypass it.

But it's not common. So for the time being, redbean users have the advantage.

If taking away normal users' agency is an advantage to you, you go and use it.

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#255

I work in this space at a company you've heard of - even at our scale and with our resources the proportionally larger attack incentives mean we are constantly firefighting. > The other alternatives all suck to the extent of my knowledge, they're either prohibitively convoluted, or web3 cryptocurrency micro-transaction nonsense that while sure it would work, also monetizes every single interaction in a way that is mo…

Anyone aware of any major platforms taking this approach? The Postal Service? Sure, there's junk mail, but imagine how much junk mail there would be if it were delivered for free. It wasn't until phone calls became so cheap as to be "unlimited" that we ended up flooded with billions of junk calls. Microtransactions (non-crypto, thankyouverymuch) would solve a certain number of today's problems.

I do think it would help, like even if a transaction cost 0.05c, it would add up very quickly for a bot operator but stay cheap for everyone else. But I think the problem is it would inevitably introduce the need for a middle man, shaving 0.01c off that 0.05c, with a dubious incentive to increase the amount of money changing hands as much as possible. What you've invented at that point is basically Cloudflare with worse incentives.

You get either that, or yucky defi web3 crap.

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#256

I work in this space at a company you've heard of - even at our scale and with our resources the proportionally larger attack incentives mean we are constantly firefighting. > The other alternatives all suck to the extent of my knowledge, they're either prohibitively convoluted, or web3 cryptocurrency micro-transaction nonsense that while sure it would work, also monetizes every single interaction in a way that is mo…

Anyone aware of any major platforms taking this approach? The Postal Service? Sure, there's junk mail, but imagine how much junk mail there would be if it were delivered for free. It wasn't until phone calls became so cheap as to be "unlimited" that we ended up flooded with billions of junk calls. Microtransactions (non-crypto, thankyouverymuch) would solve a certain number of today's problems.

Yes for sure, I have thought about making an email "stamp" web-3 service that would implement this. I even wanted to make some fun "pony express" animations whenever a letter was arriving to your inbox.

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#257
post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have not seen any arguments yet, why Satoshi is not Adam. I did say "crypto currency, that is suitable for mining in the browser" for exactly this reason: That Bitcoin is not well suited for it. One would have to look at what typical consumer hardware is good at. Maybe an algorithm that saturates one CPU core with serial calculations that need fast access to exactly 1GB of RAM. I think consumer hardware is pretty g…

You'd only need lightning integration and paying a small amount of sats, recycling the Bitcoin proof of work instead of making more. You could even have the server transfer the same sats back and forth as a token as long as the server side is happy.

"only"

You will not get your visitors to buy Bitcoin and set up a lighnign wallet to visit your website.

But having some JS on your site that crunches numbers for 2 seconds before the user can progress would work.

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#258
post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In other words, make your website unusable for people who have to connect through VPNs or public networks, difficult for anyone without a stable Western broadband connection, and unpleasant for everyone else.

With a bit of work any limits can be fine-tuned usually not to impact actual users behind NATs. Some collateral does happen but that's an unfortunate reality. I'd like you to elaborate on the rest of your comment though.

I agree that there's a "that's life" aspect to collateral/tradeoff.

That said, I sympathize somewhat with the parent. "Done right, negative side effects are minimal" is an uncomforting statement. First, because things are often not implemented correctly. There are a lot of details and tuning that will often fail to materialize in practice. Second, because long tail usability issues can often go overlooked. The abuse->anti-abuse feedback loop is pretty tight. Abuse gets identified and counteracted. The anti-abuse-> UX problems loop tends to be noticeably looser. Often, it's just aggregates (revenue/AUD/etc).

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#259
post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd only need lightning integration and paying a small amount of sats, recycling the Bitcoin proof of work instead of making more. You could even have the server transfer the same sats back and forth as a token as long as the server side is happy.

"only" You will not get your visitors to buy Bitcoin and set up a lighnign wallet to visit your website. But having some JS on your site that crunches numbers for 2 seconds before the user can progress would work.

Well it would "just" have to be integrated in browsers. :)

You don't have to buy it, you could crunch numbers for an equivalent cost if that's preferable. The advantage is that the effort can be stored and used later, so you need not even add a 2 second latency. Similar to "Privacy Pass".

Re: Botspam apocalypse

#260

I get a ton of spam from my contact me pages even with a captcha in place, i've been experimenting with loading an initial dummy form and replacing it within a few seconds of loading to the real deal which seems to have cut down on bots submitting stuff. Rate limit everything you can and use a captcha where acceptable, there are also a load of public IP and email blacklists that you can use to run a quick check. Work…

Same! The captcha doesn't seem to be able to slow down the bots. Inbox is still getting flooded with spam.
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