My guest book

[Hugh]

Have just visited the guest book for my web page, and found that there had been many many postings about sex etc. Believe I have it corrected, phoned the company, and they have installed a new program. If anyone has viewed the guest book, My SINCERE Apology, I DO NOT!!!! have anything to do with such things.

[Mitchell]

Hugh,

During some of my searches on spammers, I came across a forum with discussion on web security for all types of internet and phone systems. I think you can find it with a search on "security watch"....if you are interested.

[LCorbett]

Hugh,
I had a guestbook that I paid a yearly fee for. I started getting postings for porn sites, too. I set mine up so that I was notified about every new posting withing minutes of the post. Not a problem...I could delete the offending post. UNTIL, some creative spammer (yes, these "people" are some of the most creative and sneaky people on the web) coded his post so that whenever I tried to delete HIS post, it actually deleted the PREVIOUS post...I have NO CLUE how it was done.
After many letters to the guestbook hosting service, and no replies, I gave up and went to another service.

I now have my guestbook set up so that before any postings are made public, I must approve them first. I again have it set up so that I am notified by email within minutes of each new posting. I simply log on and approve or deny the post...I haven't had any problems so far doing it this way. Many attempted porn postings, but none have made it thru my ever watchful eye.

My new service is e-guestbooks.com
I think the service is around 10 bux per year, which erases all the ads (just another form of spam in my opinion) plus gives me some additional features (like being able to approve hte message before it can be actually posted).

The other service is TheGuestbook.com
DO NOT use this service. Their idea of Customer Service is to ignore the customer.

My suggestion to you, Hugh...or anyone else who maintains a guestbook...is, if possible, set yours up the way I described, or check it every single day.

It's sad that these sorry excuses for humans actually dictate how we use the web, and force us to use our time to patrol our own sites for this crap.

[Hugh]

Thanks Lori, If I have further problems, I'll try your suggestion. However the guest book assures me that they have installed adequate protection. Keeping my fingers crossed. My guest book was and is set up to notify me of entries, but somehow the spammers or smut were able to by pass that. To say the very least, I was completely shocked. I'm a long ways from perfect, but despise such smut.

[LCorbett]

Good enough, Hugh! I hate the stuff, too...
I have found that the option of approving or denying the posts beforehand is about as failsafe a method as I've seen. Eliminates the posts by the crap-meisters 100%!

[Anthony Filetti]

Hugh,
As an IT geek (almost 30 years) I too have an intolerance for folks who have nothing better to do but disrupt our lives in such an intrusive way. We shouldn't haven't to put up with it and completely sympathize with the situation they have put you in in having to post this message.