Add mechanisms to reduce registration spam #15276
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ClearlyClaire
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For now, those counter-measures seem to have worked very well. Time will tell whether those where generic spam bots or Mastodon-specific ones that could easily adapt to the new countermeasures, though. |
Gargron
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Dec 7, 2020
Gargron
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Dec 7, 2020
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| // Empty the honeypot fields in JS in case something like an extension | ||
| // automatically filled them. | ||
| delegate(document, '#registration_new_user,#new_user', 'submit', () => { |
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Is this not going to help bots that execute JS, i.e. headless Chrome?
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It probably is… I don't know how prevalent those are.
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I suspect those that execute JS would ignore fields with display: none anyway
Add two honeypot fields: a fake website input and a fake password confirmation one. The label/placeholder/aria-label tells not to fill them, and they are hidden in CSS, so legitimate users should not fall into these. This should cut down on some non-Mastodon-specific spambots.
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Gargron
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Gargron
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| @@ -10,6 +10,9 @@ | |||
| = f.input :password, placeholder: t('simple_form.labels.defaults.password'), required: true, input_html: { 'aria-label' => t('simple_form.labels.defaults.password'), :autocomplete => 'off', :minlength => User.password_length.first, :maxlength => User.password_length.last }, hint: false, disabled: closed_registrations? | |||
| = f.input :password_confirmation, placeholder: t('simple_form.labels.defaults.confirm_password'), required: true, input_html: { 'aria-label' => t('simple_form.labels.defaults.confirm_password'), :autocomplete => 'off' }, hint: false, disabled: closed_registrations? | |||
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| = f.input :confirm_password, as: :string, placeholder: t('simple_form.labels.defaults.honeypot', label: t('simple_form.labels.defaults.password')), required: false, input_html: { 'aria-label' => t('simple_form.labels.defaults.honeypot', label: t('simple_form.labels.defaults.password')), :autocomplete => 'off' }, hint: false, disabled: closed_registrations? | |||
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Is there any point localizing the "Password" intended to catch bots?
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Not really I guess, but there's not really any harm either, it's not a new string
Gargron
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This PR introduces several techniques to limit registration spam:
To avoid legitimate users filling them in, they have distinctive labels/placeholders, have a
display: hiddenstyle, and are cleared via javascript on form submission.Those techniques have not been widely tested on Mastodon instances yet, so neither their efficiency or their downsides have been fully tested yet, but I expect it to significantly cut down on generic spam bots (which seem to be very prevalent on instances with approval-based registrations, because of the textarea).
Note that rejecting registration attempts is important for two reasons: