Is anyone keeping an updated list of "referral spam"-vertized websites?

December 11, 2003 1:43 AM

Is anyone keeping an updated list of "referral spam"-vertized websites? My referrer logs are being overrun - it's hard to keep up with all the new spammer sites that seem to pop up.
posted by jca to Computers & Internet (9 answers total)

I made a lazyweb request about this sort of thing last month, but got no comments. I hope you have better luck than I did.
posted by will at 2:21 AM on December 11, 2003

MT-Blacklist has been fantastic fantastic fantastic ( I donated) at eliminating irritating comment spam from my MT blog. The latest list of spamming sites is here:

http://www.jayallen.org/comment_spam/blacklist.txt
posted by planetkyoto at 2:49 AM on December 11, 2003

Seconding mad props to Jay for MT-Blacklist, here, although his tool is dealing with another flavour of marketron eveil entirely, I guess. (spamments as opposed to spafferals?)

I've never noticed referral spam before, but I don't check my logs very much these days....
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 2:53 AM on December 11, 2003

Also, because Jay's navigation is a little, er, arcane, here's a link to the Moveable Type plugin planetkyoto mentioned, if you didn't have it already.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 2:57 AM on December 11, 2003

jca, what referrer log tool are you using? If you're using Dean Allen's Refer, maybe my current exclude array can help:


$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'bloogz';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'kooqoo';

$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'randomcashblaster';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'multicashrandomizer';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'make-money-program';

$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'websearchus.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'bongohome.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'teoras.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'saulem.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'a-b-l-o-g.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'mikesspot.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'kwmap.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'jennifersblog.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'wr18.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'worldnewslog.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'saulem.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'malixya.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'kwlablog.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'akksess.com';

$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'zdenka.accepted.cc';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'www2.kedgy.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'freenudecelebrity.net';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'shatteredreality.net';

$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'acetools.biz';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'direct-email-marketing-software.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = '1-bulk-email-software.org';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'bulk-email-marketing-software.org';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'bulk-email-software-marketing.net';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'email-newsletter-software.net';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'email-marketing-software.org';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'bulk-email-software-1.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'mailsoft.biz';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'atsync.com';
$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'lmhsoft.com';

$rcfg['exclude'][] = 'mp3int.com';


You can also use your Apache httpd.conf/.htaccess file to deny referrals from the spammers' websites, or direct access from their hosts. (Hosts and IP's, of course, can be spoofed, so be careful.) Idly.org has more info on fake blog referral spam, and also check the "Clone Blogs" thread in the blue.

If anyone else has stuff to add to the Refer blacklist, might as well post it here. I'll put up a page for it somewhere.
posted by brownpau at 5:09 AM on December 11, 2003

Can someone explain this phenonemon? I've been hearing a bit about it... but I think there's something I'm missing.
posted by ph00dz at 8:00 AM on December 11, 2003

My current load of comment spammers (with MT blacklist) is small enough that I can still keep up with it manually. Lately I've taken to deleting their url links leaving their inane comments and e-mail address for spiders to pick up. The last few I've also publicly posted their IP as well.

Also, Dive into Mark had a good post on weblog spam. The battle may just only be begining.
posted by KnitWit at 8:03 AM on December 11, 2003

I virtually eliminated referral spam by reworking my logging script so that it's triggered from an image embedded in the page rather than the page load itself. The referral spammers don't load images, just the main page, so I never see them.
posted by kindall at 9:06 AM on December 11, 2003

Response by poster: Appreciate all the help. Weblog comment spam and referral spam are two slightly different, but related beasts. (I'm using MT-Blacklist and an Image Code to fight the comment spam battle.)

The referral spam is getting much much worse lately. (I check my logs every day.) I don't see how we'll be able to keep up with it since it's relatively easy/cheap for those spammers to simply use the 100s of spam domains they own for such practices. I looked through Google at the latest spamvertised site, and it's getting a lot of "juice" from all the "My Last 20 Referrers" type links - people need to discontinue that practice.

brownpau: You can add this to your list:

www.fastcrawl.com

This domain is simply a redirect to an affiliate account id for "host it cheap.com" (url broken with spaces to prosecute the guility). The sad thing is I found other posts complaining about this particular affiliate ID referral spam and emails sent to the affiliate program in question - they don't seem to care - meaning they are part of the problem.
posted by jca at 10:26 AM on December 11, 2003