Comments on: Blocking Certain Countries (India and Russia) From Viewing and Spamming My Website http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/ Just another WordPress weblog Wed, 04 Jan 2012 22:34:09 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-6114 Jill Olkoski Mon, 25 Apr 2011 19:03:45 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-6114 Actually, I completely disagree and I'll explain why. This article is not about email spam, it's about website spam, people in other countries who view your website and use it to solicit your business. For me, I used to get at least 5 emails and 1 phone call a week from India, Russia, etc asking me to outsource my web design services. Since I've blocked these countries from viewing my website, these emails and phone calls have stopped. So it's one thing to talk about things in theory, it's another to actually see the results. I've done this, and all of the solicitations via email and phone calls from India have literally stopped, and so for me, this practice of blocking countries from seeing my website is working perfectly. Since I am not really interested in doing business overseas, blocking the countries that send out spam (phone, email, whatever) works. Referencing this article: http://bighow.com/guides/simplelist-10-countries-that-send-most-spam The list of spammy countries : 1. Russian Federation 11.92% 2. United States 9.36% 3. Brazil 7.48% 4. Turkey 5.43% 5. Columbia 5.34% 6. Argentina 4.96% 7. India 4.26% 8. China 3.39% 9. Spain 2.69% 10. Republic of Korea 2.57% Now, which countries are most interested in outsourcing (the source of my calls)...Russia, India. So that's who I block. You block the countries who you don't want spam from, and who you don't have a business interest in. Again, this is not an article about email spam. This is people who visit my website and then call me on the phone trying to sell me things. I can easily track this, and the visitors who created the calls were from India and Russia. This has fixed my problem totally. So before you call a method "stupid", perhaps you should take a deep breath and read the original article more closely and understand the problem that I was trying to fix and my actual results. Actually, I completely disagree and I’ll explain why. This article is not about email spam, it’s about website spam, people in other countries who view your website and use it to solicit your business. For me, I used to get at least 5 emails and 1 phone call a week from India, Russia, etc asking me to outsource my web design services. Since I’ve blocked these countries from viewing my website, these emails and phone calls have stopped. So it’s one thing to talk about things in theory, it’s another to actually see the results. I’ve done this, and all of the solicitations via email and phone calls from India have literally stopped, and so for me, this practice of blocking countries from seeing my website is working perfectly. Since I am not really interested in doing business overseas, blocking the countries that send out spam (phone, email, whatever) works.

Referencing this article:
http://bighow.com/guides/simplelist-10-countries-that-send-most-spam

The list of spammy countries :

1. Russian Federation 11.92%
2. United States 9.36%
3. Brazil 7.48%
4. Turkey 5.43%
5. Columbia 5.34%
6. Argentina 4.96%
7. India 4.26%
8. China 3.39%
9. Spain 2.69%
10. Republic of Korea 2.57%

Now, which countries are most interested in outsourcing (the source of my calls)…Russia, India. So that’s who I block. You block the countries who you don’t want spam from, and who you don’t have a business interest in. Again, this is not an article about email spam. This is people who visit my website and then call me on the phone trying to sell me things. I can easily track this, and the visitors who created the calls were from India and Russia. This has fixed my problem totally. So before you call a method “stupid”, perhaps you should take a deep breath and read the original article more closely and understand the problem that I was trying to fix and my actual results.

]]> By: Whoever http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-6113 Whoever Mon, 25 Apr 2011 10:55:54 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-6113 The problem being, if you really want to fight spam effectively this way, you really need to block all of the U.S. first as it is the world's #1 spam distributor. In fact half of the spam you get from India is actually US spam as well, just using proxies, IP spoofing and other techniques the bloody Xrumer software knows. Black holing, even combined with geotagging is a quite stupid countermeasure like the famous "drainging the seas to fight pirates" and it's bearing some fuel for discussions about ethically dubious conduct. After all, you're banning lots of people because one of them behaved wrong, that's like banning muslims from a restaurant due to OBL. Even more, it's completely ineffective! Aforementioned spam software just uses a list of open proxies and "zombie" computers in a country. If you ban that country, the software will simply switch to other proxies in other countries after some time. If nothing works anymore you will get the same spam (since it's still the same actual sender) from e.g. Kraftservers Inc. in the USA. It's a quite slippery slope, not even worth the hassle and first and foremost *the wrong battlefield*! - The proper address for your complaints is Google Inc., who invented and popularized all the incentive for the spam we suffer from - their stupid ranking algorithm. They alledgedly changed it recently but still it's easy to completely dominate Google ranking with some link spam. - Another proper address you could turn to are the companies themselves who buy black hat SEO link spamming. Use their contact forms and email addresses to let them know that their spam was found and reported to the various anti-spam networks*. Many small businesses are hiring bad web companies, probably not even knowing that they use vandalism to provide their services and might be surprised and intimidated by the news and sue the company they hired. If you have a Google Webmaster account, you can report them. Apparently too few people are using this so Google never seems to react on that. You can also report them on Siteadvisor, Web Of Trust and similar sites when a company page commits database vandalism. In some countries, if the company that was spammed for and the spammed forum are both registered there, you can even sue them. At any rate, fight the spammers and the creators of the spam environment, not countries by blackholing. You're using a vaccuum to fight dirt in your house and not putting a carpet over it every time, do you? * These anti-spam networks (StopForumSpam, Spamhaus etc.) also provide convenient APIs for your forum software to do some more targeted banning of only reported IPs, without slowing down your forums software to a crawl by long local ban lists. You can contribute by (automatically) report the yet unknown spam IPs and email addresses you blocked on your site. This doesn't spoil IP addresses for all time, is pretty effective and lets you distinguish between "potential legitimate user" and "actual spammer" The problem being, if you really want to fight spam effectively this way, you really need to block all of the U.S. first as it is the world’s #1 spam distributor. In fact half of the spam you get from India is actually US spam as well, just using proxies, IP spoofing and other techniques the bloody Xrumer software knows.

Black holing, even combined with geotagging is a quite stupid countermeasure like the famous “drainging the seas to fight pirates” and it’s bearing some fuel for discussions about ethically dubious conduct. After all, you’re banning lots of people because one of them behaved wrong, that’s like banning muslims from a restaurant due to OBL.

Even more, it’s completely ineffective! Aforementioned spam software just uses a list of open proxies and “zombie” computers in a country. If you ban that country, the software will simply switch to other proxies in other countries after some time. If nothing works anymore you will get the same spam (since it’s still the same actual sender) from e.g. Kraftservers Inc. in the USA. It’s a quite slippery slope, not even worth the hassle and first and foremost *the wrong battlefield*!

- The proper address for your complaints is Google Inc., who invented and popularized all the incentive for the spam we suffer from – their stupid ranking algorithm. They alledgedly changed it recently but still it’s easy to completely dominate Google ranking with some link spam.

- Another proper address you could turn to are the companies themselves who buy black hat SEO link spamming. Use their contact forms and email addresses to let them know that their spam was found and reported to the various anti-spam networks*. Many small businesses are hiring bad web companies, probably not even knowing that they use vandalism to provide their services and might be surprised and intimidated by the news and sue the company they hired.

If you have a Google Webmaster account, you can report them. Apparently too few people are using this so Google never seems to react on that. You can also report them on Siteadvisor, Web Of Trust and similar sites when a company page commits database vandalism. In some countries, if the company that was spammed for and the spammed forum are both registered there, you can even sue them. At any rate, fight the spammers and the creators of the spam environment, not countries by blackholing. You’re using a vaccuum to fight dirt in your house and not putting a carpet over it every time, do you?

*
These anti-spam networks (StopForumSpam, Spamhaus etc.) also provide convenient APIs for your forum software to do some more targeted banning of only reported IPs, without slowing down your forums software to a crawl by long local ban lists. You can contribute by (automatically) report the yet unknown spam IPs and email addresses you blocked on your site. This doesn’t spoil IP addresses for all time, is pretty effective and lets you distinguish between “potential legitimate user” and “actual spammer”

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5473 Jill Olkoski Wed, 24 Feb 2010 20:39:24 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5473 Well, my hosting company does have good and bad days, just like me :-) Well, my hosting company does have good and bad days, just like me :-)

]]> By: Mike http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5472 Mike Wed, 24 Feb 2010 20:35:27 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5472 Yeah Jill your blog loaded faster today. Yeah Jill your blog loaded faster today.

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5471 Jill Olkoski Wed, 24 Feb 2010 17:37:50 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5471 Hi Mike, I have no way of knowing who may have signed up for Web-Stat. I haven't noticed the blog is loading slowly. Any external code you put on your site will impact the loading time, but I haven't had issues with Web-Stat code. Hi Mike,
I have no way of knowing who may have signed up for Web-Stat. I haven’t noticed the blog is loading slowly. Any external code you put on your site will impact the loading time, but I haven’t had issues with Web-Stat code.

]]> By: Mike http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5469 Mike Wed, 24 Feb 2010 08:40:44 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5469 Hi Jill I signed up for a Web-Stat free trial to try to stop the spam at my forum on Saturday Feb. 20th. Did you get credit for my sign up? I got side tracked a bit so I'm just getting it set up. I've noticed in the last couple of days (Feb. 22nd & 23rd) that this blog of yours is loading fairly slowly. Very slowly in fact. Do you think Web-Stat is slowing down the load time of your blog? Or is it something else? I don't remember it being this slow loading last Saturday. Thanks Mike Hi Jill

I signed up for a Web-Stat free trial to try to stop the spam at my forum on Saturday Feb. 20th. Did you get credit for my sign up? I got side tracked a bit so I’m just getting it set up. I’ve noticed in the last couple of days (Feb. 22nd & 23rd) that this blog of yours is loading fairly slowly. Very slowly in fact. Do you think Web-Stat is slowing down the load time of your blog? Or is it something else? I don’t remember it being this slow loading last Saturday.

Thanks
Mike

]]> By: Carla http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5443 Carla Fri, 12 Feb 2010 01:30:44 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5443 Thanks for answering my question as to why are so many of my blog visitors from India. I do receive a lot of spam comments and now I know why. Thanks for answering my question as to why are so many of my blog visitors from India. I do receive a lot of spam comments and now I know why.

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5420 Jill Olkoski Fri, 29 Jan 2010 17:18:47 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5420 Hi Richard, I can say I've been really, really happy with the Geo Targeting feature of Web-Stat. Every once in a while, for some reason, a single visitor gets through, but I'd say it successfully blocks 99%, which actually saves me time, as I'm not getting as many solicitations. Hi Richard,
I can say I’ve been really, really happy with the Geo Targeting feature of Web-Stat. Every once in a while, for some reason, a single visitor gets through, but I’d say it successfully blocks 99%, which actually saves me time, as I’m not getting as many solicitations.

]]> By: Richard Cummings http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5419 Richard Cummings Fri, 29 Jan 2010 13:54:29 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5419 Ah, I just came across this article because I have a HUGELY disproportionate amount of Russian visitors to my websites. Surprisingly, I did not find a whole lot of information (people must not check their stats much) but I really like this idea of geo-targeting and may give it shot. Thanks for the heads up Jill! Ah, I just came across this article because I have a HUGELY disproportionate amount of Russian visitors to my websites. Surprisingly, I did not find a whole lot of information (people must not check their stats much) but I really like this idea of geo-targeting and may give it shot. Thanks for the heads up Jill!

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5306 Jill Olkoski Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:44:10 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5306 Hi Matt, Thanks very much for posting the info, I didn't know Web-Stat could block states, zipcodes, IPAddresses...in addition to countries. I'm very glad it's working for you and you got what you needed! Again, thanks for posting the information. Hi Matt,
Thanks very much for posting the info, I didn’t know Web-Stat could block states, zipcodes, IPAddresses…in addition to countries. I’m very glad it’s working for you and you got what you needed! Again, thanks for posting the information.

]]> By: Matt http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5305 Matt Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:14:26 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5305 All, Using the Geo-targeting feature at Web-Stat I was able to block my website from visits by users in certain states. If you have a need to block certain visitors you should take a look, the Geo-targeting feature lets you get very specific about who you want handled differently. It goes down to states, zip codes, even IP addresses. Matt All,

Using the Geo-targeting feature at Web-Stat I was able to block my website from visits by users in certain states. If you have a need to block certain visitors you should take a look, the Geo-targeting feature lets you get very specific about who you want handled differently. It goes down to states, zip codes, even IP addresses.

Matt

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5292 Jill Olkoski Sat, 24 Oct 2009 17:56:16 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5292 Hi Matt, To the best of my knowledge, WebStat only can block countries, not states. I'm not sure which level allow you to block access because I always recommend the premium package to get the most info about visitors. I haven't heard of someone wanting to block traffic from certain states in the US. I'd say the best thing to do is to email the folks at Web-Stat.com and ask about blocking states and the membership level. Hi Matt,
To the best of my knowledge, WebStat only can block countries, not states. I’m not sure which level allow you to block access because I always recommend the premium package to get the most info about visitors. I haven’t heard of someone wanting to block traffic from certain states in the US. I’d say the best thing to do is to email the folks at Web-Stat.com and ask about blocking states and the membership level.

]]> By: Matt http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5290 Matt Sat, 24 Oct 2009 14:31:50 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5290 Hi Jill, Thanks for putting up a post on this topic. If you dont mind, I have a couple of questions about the functionality of WebStat. I would like to block all visitors in certain states from viewing our website and WebStat seems like the least complicated solution. First, based on what you have seen, do you think WebStat would effectively block users in certain US states? Second, are you able to identify the user level (basic, plus, or premium) necessary to access the visitor blocking feature? Yours, Matt Hi Jill,

Thanks for putting up a post on this topic. If you dont mind, I have a couple of questions about the functionality of WebStat. I would like to block all visitors in certain states from viewing our website and WebStat seems like the least complicated solution. First, based on what you have seen, do you think WebStat would effectively block users in certain US states? Second, are you able to identify the user level (basic, plus, or premium) necessary to access the visitor blocking feature?

Yours,

Matt

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-5000 Jill Olkoski Wed, 03 Jun 2009 15:45:57 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-5000 Hi Heather, While a few do slip through (presumably since they have Javascript turned off), the vast majority, I'd say like 95% are blocked. I don't think I've got a single phone call to outsource my work since I've activated the Web-Stat blocker. The other thing I do, is that if I notice someone slipped through (via Web-Stat) I will add that IP address to my .htaccess file. But this happens only once a week or two. Used to get maybe 5-10 hits a day, so this is a large reduction. In fact, every time I get a spam or solicitation from a country that's non US, I block it via Web-Stat. The amount of aggravation has gone way down, I love it. Web-Stat does have a 30 day free trial, so you could give it a run. Since it works immediately, I'd imagine after a month you could tell. Understand the primary reason I have Web-Stat is to analyze my traffic, the blocking capability is just a lovely feature they added. Hi Heather,
While a few do slip through (presumably since they have Javascript turned off), the vast majority, I’d say like 95% are blocked. I don’t think I’ve got a single phone call to outsource my work since I’ve activated the Web-Stat blocker. The other thing I do, is that if I notice someone slipped through (via Web-Stat) I will add that IP address to my .htaccess file. But this happens only once a week or two. Used to get maybe 5-10 hits a day, so this is a large reduction. In fact, every time I get a spam or solicitation from a country that’s non US, I block it via Web-Stat. The amount of aggravation has gone way down, I love it. Web-Stat does have a 30 day free trial, so you could give it a run. Since it works immediately, I’d imagine after a month you could tell. Understand the primary reason I have Web-Stat is to analyze my traffic, the blocking capability is just a lovely feature they added.

]]> By: Heather http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-4999 Heather Wed, 03 Jun 2009 09:59:30 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-4999 Hi Jill. I'm glad I've found this post, as I have had it up to here with the daily barrage of spam from Indian SEO and web design firms. Like yourself, the ONLY unsolicited email and calls I get are from these firms in India, and as with your business, some days my site gets more hits from India than my own country. I'm absolutely fed up with having every work day interrupted multiple times by this garbage and I need to put a stop to it one way or the other. I see that you wrote this post in January, so I'm curious as to how the service has worked for you in the long run. Is it worth investing in? Hi Jill. I’m glad I’ve found this post, as I have had it up to here with the daily barrage of spam from Indian SEO and web design firms. Like yourself, the ONLY unsolicited email and calls I get are from these firms in India, and as with your business, some days my site gets more hits from India than my own country. I’m absolutely fed up with having every work day interrupted multiple times by this garbage and I need to put a stop to it one way or the other.

I see that you wrote this post in January, so I’m curious as to how the service has worked for you in the long run. Is it worth investing in?

]]> By: Thomas Reardon http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-4913 Thomas Reardon Sun, 03 May 2009 19:52:49 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-4913 I will work it out one way or another, Thank you I will work it out one way or another, Thank you

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-4912 Jill Olkoski Sun, 03 May 2009 19:13:58 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-4912 Hmmm, I have no idea. The hosting companies I usually deal with are always on Linux and Unix. I hope you can figure something out. Maybe switch to a different hosting company? Hmmm, I have no idea. The hosting companies I usually deal with are always on Linux and Unix. I hope you can figure something out. Maybe switch to a different hosting company?

]]> By: Thomas Reardon http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-4911 Thomas Reardon Sun, 03 May 2009 19:08:25 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-4911 OH NO I have the list of IP addresses it is about 950 Imp Addresses and I'm on a windows server. I don't think I can use .htaccess on a windows server. OH NO I have the list of IP addresses it is about 950 Imp Addresses and I’m on a windows server. I don’t think I can use .htaccess on a windows server.

]]> By: Jill Olkoski http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-4910 Jill Olkoski Sun, 03 May 2009 19:02:57 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-4910 Hi Tomas, One thing to mention, is that since Web-Stat uses Javascript, there may still be visitors who slip through. I've seen this on occasion. If you look in Web-Stat and see that people are still coming from New Zealand - you may have to utilize the .htaccess solution and block all IP addresses in New Zealand. Hi Tomas,
One thing to mention, is that since Web-Stat uses Javascript, there may still be visitors who slip through. I’ve seen this on occasion. If you look in Web-Stat and see that people are still coming from New Zealand – you may have to utilize the .htaccess solution and block all IP addresses in New Zealand.

]]> By: Thomas Reardon http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/blocking-certain-countries-india-and-russia-from-viewing-and-spamming-my-website/comment-page-1/#comment-4909 Thomas Reardon Sun, 03 May 2009 19:00:29 +0000 http://aldebaranwebdesign.com/blog/?p=561#comment-4909 Yes it is hard to believe, New Zealand was able to have my website shut down. I simply moved it to another server (the server made the dissension with out contacting me) any way I have been in contact with web-stat and I think I can Just Block New Zealand from viewing my site. then there will be no trademark infringement. Thank you for your help Yes it is hard to believe, New Zealand was able to have my website shut down. I simply moved it to another server (the server made the dissension with out contacting me) any way I have been in contact with web-stat and I think I can Just Block New Zealand from viewing my site. then there will be no trademark infringement.
Thank you for your help

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