Spamming my Guestbook

[duckrogers]

Hi,
I'm getting 8 or 12 entries in my guest book, of just web address's, and meaningless. It's a very simply guest book and have no way to stopping it via that way. BUT is there another?
Suggestions?
Thanks,
DR

[YvetteKuhns]

Any time you use a script that allows user input, you can expect to get junk input. You can stop using a guestbook or simply delete the posts. You can probably add a form validation script (using Javascript for example) to check if all fields have input. You can also check to see if an email has something before and after the @ symbol. You can check for junk names or bad words. If you don't get the desired input, the form never gets submitted and never appears on your website.

[duckrogers]

thank you.
Do you think this is an automated thing, or manual? Does manually removing them, matter?

[YvetteKuhns]

thank you.
Do you think this is an automated thing, or manual?

The spam could be automatically or manually submitted. I have read some guestbook posts on other guestbooks and the people actually commented on the website as well as added spam, so those posts were manually done.

[duckrogers]

thanks guys.
I'm not very advanced so adding something like Captcha is probably beyond my scope.
I'm willing however, to install a completely new guest book. But would there be a way to save my previous entries? My current guestbook is very simply and creates a separate .ent file for each entry. Would there be another guestbook that would protect against SPAM entries while keeping my 100 or so current entries?

[Rick_E]

To reduce automated entries, add a text box and validate for a specific entry such as "1234" Display the 1234 in a GIF image to show people what to enter.

[YvetteKuhns]

I'm willing however, to install a completely new guest book. But would there be a way to save my previous entries?

You can actually view your guestbook and save these entries in a text or html file. You can even use XML or CSV flat files. You can re-enter the entries into the new guestbook or save in a separate archives web page.

Rick's suggestion to create an image code validation for manual entries is good to prevent or reduce automated entries. But a person could sit there and manually spam your guestbook. You still need to view your entries to manage them.

[stevel]

Or do away with the guestbook entirely. These don't serve any useful purpose that I can see and are like ringing the dinner bell for spammers.

[(jj)]

A guestbook that has several anti-spam features is Gbook from PHP Junkyard - http://phpjunkyard.com/php-guestbook-script.php

It is even available in the Instant Installer in OPs > Packages > Site Tools