MyBB Community Forums

(2013-01-02, 02:38 AM)Paul H. Wrote: [ -> ]I can have unlimited emails @paulhedman.com. There are thousands of free disposable email providers. You're not going to be able to prevent duplicate account by email... if you want that, an IP ban is the most effective.

If I notice that lots of spammers are registering from a particular host and I don't have any legitimate users from that host, I might as well do a wildcard ban @letmehackyou.com - a feature already present in MyBB.

These bans and filters won't keep all spammers out, just like there is not a physical lock that can't be broken. The point is to make it hard enough so that would-be spammers don't get enough results to make it worth their time.

But I don't particularly believe that implementing rules for (popular) third party email systems belongs in a forum system in the first place. Perhaps a system for allowing pluggable filters could be a solution, but rules should be put into a more easily updated plugin or similar (where admins can choose not to install these rules).