Russian Spambots

[kudagirl]

I got friended by 5 people this week.  When I checked out their journals and profiles, it was in Russian.  I reported them as a possible spam-bot and banned them.  This is ridiculous.  The ones who friended me are the following: portyr , yjvavot , dobres , ampybnj , bghsaj .

I was curious about what they posted. So I used an online translator to try to figure out what it said. One

Comments

[rivertempest]

Dasvedanya, Drusia! (hello friend)

hehehehe - I got a friend from someone that, I have NO idea how or WHY they friended me. I'm considering blocking them, even though everything is in English.

[kudagirl]

Gutenmorgen mein Freund. Ich spreche deutsches wenig, aber keinen Russen.

These friendings seem to come in groups. If I have seen comments with their names or their journals seem to show common interests, I don't have a problem. If I see Russian, I just report them. LJ makes it easy to report them now, but it is irritating to have to deal with it at all.

[debris4spike]

I got friended by someone that was just trying to get you into Google advertising - at least it was all in English!

[kudagirl]

I don't know why they would think we would friend a journal we can even read. Stupid.

[cordykitten]

Weird... I thought they would learn that they are getting kicked out from LJ if they try to spam.

[kudagirl]

Many of the spambots are computerized. They aren't a person. As long as they are successful in a per cent, it will continue. All we can do is have the proper type of protection on our personal computer and report them to the site owners.

Here in the States, we have had problems with phones and cell phones. People calling to sell stuff or try to get you to give them your information so they can use it. The government created a no call list. You register your home and cell number then these people are not allowed to call you. If they do you can report them and they have to pay a fine.

[cordykitten]

Here in Germany it's forbidden to advertise via phone if you aren't allowed to do it by the owner of the phone. But you first have to catch them. They don't have the number showing when they call you. But still, it's better now that this is law than it was before.

[kudagirl]

Here if it is a company you have given your phone number to like your credit card company or if it is charity they can call you. Otherwise they can't call you if you have put your number on the no call list.

I noticed three of the names I reported are now deleted by Live Journal. That just happened in the last hour. So yay!