cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/177673

Cross posting this here for visibility since lemmy.ml federation has been very hit or miss the last week. Original post from @[email protected]

Today, a bunch of new instances appeared in the top of the user count list. It appears that these instances are all being bombarded by bot sign-ups.

For now, it seems that the bots are especially targeting instances that have:

  • Open sign-ups
  • No captcha
  • No e-mail verification

I have put together a spreadsheet of some of the most suspicious cases here.

If this is affecting you, I would highly recommend considering one of the following options:

  1. Close sign-ups entirely
  2. Only allow sign-ups with applications
  3. Enable e-mail verification + captcha for sign-ups

Additionally, I would recommend pre-emptively banning as many bot accounts as possible, before they start posting spam!

Please comment below if you have any questions or anything useful to add.

  • AFK BRB Chocolate
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    121 year ago

    Why wouldn’t an instance require an email and a captcha? Seems like such an easy add that’s totally worth if it even just reduces bot traffic.

    • RQG
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      31 year ago

      I can see a reason for email in that people might want to minimize storing personal data.

      A captcha seems pretty harmless in any case.

        • RQG
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          11 year ago

          Friends? I never heard of them.

          I’ll have a look though.