Need your help in preventing spam posts

[Chacal Profile Website]

Hi everyone,
We're always trying to keep the number of spam posts down. For a while, some simple techniques (such as captcha) were sufficient to keep the spam bots out. The limit for those techniques is, of course, that they must not be annoying enough to turn legitimate people off.

But those aren't sufficient anymore as the spammers have been evolving along with the defenses. A few months ago we have switched to an excellent system for separating bots from humans: the registration form now asks a questions at random out of a pool of questions formulated so it is difficult for a script to find the answer, whereas a human being will find it easily.

This has worked well for some time, but as I said the spammers have adapted by hiring humans to get through registration. There are "sweat shops" available in former eastern bloc countries where people spend their days going through registration hurdles, getting accounts for the spam bots to come back later. In addition, databases of forums and registration answers are built and sold.

We still have 4 or 5 of those registrations every day, of which one or two end up in spam posts. This is not much, but still too much, as it is annoying for you, extra work for ECGN staff, and an open door to mounting abuse by those who buy the databases.

So I'm thinking of hiring you all for a fun exercise: making our pool of questions larger and harder to guess for those unauthorized people.

Ideal questions would be:
- non offensive for legitimate powerVS customers (those are mainly young people in north america and europe who rent powerVS voice servers for gaming purposes);
- specific enough to the interests of customers and forum users (questions about international politics would be easy for sweat shop people) but not so specific as to puzzle customers (Ex: is BTT a smacktard?)
- clear enough so there is one specific good answer (not "What are the names of the seven dwarves?")

Here is our current pool, it is more a sample than a serious pool of questions. Let's hear some suggestions!

Note the syntax:
Question:Acceptable answer: Alternate acceptable answer.



Five + three equals...:8:eight
Which of the following is NOT a fruit? apple, orange, brick, grape:brick
Which of the following is a search site? ECGN, CNN, Google, Fark:Google
Which doesn't belong? John, Ted, Chair, Mark:Chair
Which one is a flower? Rose, Chair, Madrid, Ocean:Rose
Type the next number? five, four, three, two...:one:1
Which of the following is NOT a game? BF2, Word, Half-Life, Quake:Word
How many fingers on a hand?:5:five
How many toes on a foot?:5:five
How many legs on a cow?:4:four
How many lives does a cat have?:9:nine
Which one is not evil? Bush, Halliburton, Cheney, Bambi:Bambi
Is Bill Gates poor or rich?:rich
Is a cat a plant or an animal?:animal:an animal
You must stop your car on which light? Green, Yellow, Red:Red
Are you a human, an alien or a rock?:human:a human

[Rand0m Profile]

how many eyes do we have: 2: two
how many days in the year: 365: three hundred sixty five
who is the spam lord most likely behind the spam bots: buliwyf : spam god
how many beers in a 6 pack: 6: six


more to come

[Buliwyf Profile]

/me is afraid............ very.... very.... afraid

[[ecgn] btt Profile]

What sport did Michael Jordan play? Basketball
What is typically considered "Mans best friend"? Dog: A Dog
How many Moons does the Earth have? 1: one
How many sides does a stop sign have? 8: Eight
Railroad tracks run WHAT with each other? Parallel

How much wood could a Woodchuck chuck if a Woodchuck could chuck wood? As much as it felt like chucking: 4: Ham

[Chacal Profile Website]

/me is afraid............ very.... very.... afraid

This should end well

[Rand0m Profile]

Are you a human, an alien or a rock?:human:a human

This one might be debatable for some

how many beef patties in a double-cheese burger: two: 2
how many days in the week: seven: 7
how many hours in a day: 24: twenty four: twenty 4
what is the most nutritious meal: : spam
how many years in 1 century: 100: one hundred: 100 years: one hundred years
america's favorite cookie: oreo:
which one doesn't belong? spam, buli, informative: informative
which one doesn't belong? lake, ocean, river, hill: hill
what is america's favorite sport: baseball (1-0 go sox!)

[.:DeM:.8-Mile Profile]

How do you spell smacker? smacker, wesley
What is an orange: fruit, vege, meat, fats? fruit
What month has 28 days in it? Feburary
Who is the best team in mens college basketball? UNC, University of North Carolina
How man state workers does it take to screw in a light bulb? Ten, 10

[EZC Profile Website]

Greatest Community of All Time? ECGN
Best player of all time? EZC
Who does EZC pwn at life? Donkeynutz
Who does Donkeynutz wish he was? EZC

[donkey_nutz Profile]

Greatest Community of All Time? ECGN
Best player of all time? EZC
Who does EZC pwn at life? Donkeynutz
Who does Donkeynutz wish he was? EZC

yes folks EZC is back after his breif hiatus at the mental institution...:red:

[SLASHER Profile]

Is there going to be a test over these

[gowhitesox99 Profile]

Which one is more awesome? White Sox, Cubs, Yankees, Indians:White Sox
How awesome are the White Sox? Really awesome, pretty awesome, a little awesome: Any are acceptable
When Weasel used to regularly patrol the beach at ECGN how much did he totally pwn? TONS, kind of a lot, not at all: not at all

Who blew president clinton? Hillary, Monica, Tonya Harding, Spitzer: Monica