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1. superjux
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   Hi.

   My site has been receiving hundreds of spam comments every few minutes. I have Spam Karma installed, so it is catching them and putting them in the Recent Spam Harvest folder. However, my site is continually going down because of all of this. I asked my host and they said I need to "force kill processes," which I did. However, I would have to be killing these processes constantly for this to stop and my site to be up. Does anyone have any suggestions for how to handle this?

   Thanks in advance!

   Hilary

2. iamPariah
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   Hilary,

   I hope to the sky that someone offers you better suggestions than they had for me when this happened to my WP-powered sites a year ago. Then, I was told my best option was to disable comments entirely.

   The only solution I was able to find was to buy my own co-located servers (mucho deniro) so that I had dual-core processor chips and a lot of RAM dedicated solely to running my sites.

   Shared hosting providers have to limit each site's CPU and RAM usage to protect all the other sites on the server. Spammers know how popular WordPress is, how easy it is to automatically attack, and they do it often.

   I genuinely wish you the best of luck.

3. iamPariah
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   Let me amend that. You can try installing Bad Behavior (a plug-in). For some sites, it does the trick. It didn't help my sites against the spam onslaught, however, because, though the spam didn't get through, Bad Behavior itself overloaded my former hosting company's servers.

4. Chris_K
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   I'd second the BB plugin suggestion - it has come a LONG way and saves me a lot of grief.

5. superjux
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   Okay thank you I will try the BB plugin. :)

   Can someone explain to me exactly what is happening though? Is it just because there are so many comments at once?

   Hilary

   Also, can this be used in conjunction with Spam Karma?

6. iamPariah
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   It's because every comment requires wp_comments_post.php to execute and write to the database. So many comments, so close to one another, demand more CPU cycles and more RAM to make it work.

   Spam Karma stops the spam from SHOWING on your site, but it doesn't defend against spam getting INTO your site. SK only does its thing after the spam is already in the db.

7. superjux
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   Okay, got it.

   I tried installing BB but it caused an error. I'm going to try it again tonight from home and see if I can get it to work. I'm having trouble ftping from my office.

   Thanks for all of your help!

8. superjux
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   I was able to install BB properly from home. Apparently I needed to upload it using ascii. I activated the plugin, so cross those fingers.

   Thanks again for your help!

9. moshu
   Member
   Posted 5 years ago #

   Usually, every text (code) file should be upload as ascii and NOT binary. Most ftp client have the feature to recognize it automatically.

10. superjux
    Member
    Posted 5 years ago #

    Gotcha.

    I'm learning as I'm doing.

    Will BB help with the trackback spam as well?

11. Chris_K
    Member
    Posted 5 years ago #

    Yup, it sure will.

12. superjux
    Member
    Posted 5 years ago #

    Awesome.

    Thanks!

13. superjux
    Member
    Posted 5 years ago #

    Okay, more questions.

    What are the odds of BB blocking real comments instead of spam? Is there a way to see what was blocked? Etc...

14. superjux
    Member
    Posted 5 years ago #

    Okay, strangely enough, I had been successful with the BB plugin, but earlier this week, it stopped working. The number of "access attempts" hasn't changed in a few days, and my Spam Karma folder has been filled again.

    Today, I noticed an update was available on the site, so I installed it, but it's still not working.

    Any ideas?

    Hilary

15. superjux
    Member
    Posted 4 years ago #

    I know this is an old topic, but until about a month ago, I was using Bad Behavior with no problem. Now my dashboard takes a good 30 seconds to load, commenting lags, publishing lags, and deleting/approving moderated comments also lags. At first I thought it was my hosting company's problem, then I disabled and re-enabled each plugin individually, and lo and behold, the problem only existed when I had BB enabled.

    Any thoughts? The lag is driving me nuts.

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