Comment Spam Be Gone


Horse dung - how often can you use a photo of shit on a blog. Found at: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1060896I have talked about how to keep the comment bots from leaving a ton of spam comments on your WordPress blog before. That method works but it is a little clumsy because you need to edit core WordPress files and if you forget to do it again when you upgrade your blog your comments can break or you will be flooded once again with comment spam. I always wanted to take that method and create a plugin out of it, but it looks like I have been beaten to it with the creation of WP-SpamFree.

I personally was using the method I described in my previous post on my webmaster blog that kept it off my blog so I did not have to sort through the comments and delete them.

That is when I found WP-SpamFree. WP-SpamFree uses a combination of Javascript and Cookies to prevent automated comment spam from being left. While it works on a different principle than the method I described in my method, it relies on the fact that many automated comment bots cannot handle Javascript and cookies. It is an effective combination. I have been running it on my webmaster blog for just over two weeks and the number of comment spam that I have received has dropped to nearly zero. Looking at the web server log files I can tell that the comment spam I have received has been from actual people visiting the site and leaving it, not from automated comment bots.

Installation is as easy as any other WordPress plugin. Simply download the plugin and unzip it. You will need to upload it to your WordPress blog into the plugins folder. Once it has been uploaded simply activate it in your WordPress administration section by clicking Activate on the plugins page. Once it is activated you will see a WP-SpamFree menu available on the Plugins section. Here you can configure the plugin and set some additional settings to deal with trackback and pingback spam as well as some contact form settings.

If your WordPress blog is swimming in automated comment spam give the WP-SpamFree plugin a try. It might make a world of difference in the amount of comment spam you have to sort through.

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