How I Disabled Registrations And Deleted Spam Subscribers in WordPress
Today, I logged into a Zombie site to do a re-haul and while importing some pages I was asked which one of the 459 subscribers, that I knew nothing about, I wanted to attribute authorship to. Well, none of course and by the way, where the did these subscribers come from since I don’t have an invitation anywhere on the site!
This could only mean one thing. SPAM!!!
I spent sometime scrolling through the endless list of subscribers; secretly hoping my site had somehow went viral without my knowing it, but knowing deep down inside that that probably wasn’t the case. With names like Michael458659 and similar emails, I quickly deduced the viral notion from the list of possibilities.
Well, the next step was to stop the source of the problem. After watching a quick tutorial, I knew exactly what to do to eliminate any additional subscribers from coming in then I spent a few minutes removing the 459 spam accounts 25 at a time. Watch the video to learn how to do it for yourself.
Why Would Anyone Create A Spam Subscriber Account?
My days of spamming ended back in the mid-nineties when I got kicked off of AOL; after purchasing a bulk email client and sent out a blast from a bunch of emails I purchased from the same company. So, I’m not too savvy as to how spamming is done today. Not that I was back then either.
My first thought, based solely on my experience of how spammers generally operate, is that they intended to post spam comments. Maybe they already have. I guess should probably check my moderation queue.
The Results After Checking My WordPress Comment Moderation Queue
I checked my moderation queue; only to see one comment pending. This raises some questions.
- Why were these accounts created?
- Where else could they have possibly have spammed my site.
- Should I be concerned about more devious intentions for these accounts?
I guess I’ve got some more research to do.
