Notice Use the Spoiler feature to hide your personal information from Bots and Spammers

One thing that always seems to bother me is that some people don't hesitate to post their e-mail address or phone number on a thread that is publicly viewable. This is just asking for a spam bot to scrape that information up and inundate you with spam in your e-mail and sell your phone number to telemarketers!

Some people do things like putting spaces in or spelling out a few numbers in an attempt to thwart the bots/scrapers...but I have news for you, spam bot coders adapt to these tricks really quickly - which is why simple Q&A Captcha questions like "what is the third word in this sentence" don't work.

Fortunately, there is a solution for you here on GIRS!

Xenforo has a feature built in called Spoiler. When you are composing a message, there is a little "+" sign in editor toolbar. Click that, and you will get a drop down with a few options. One of them is Spoiler

(Note: these are images, not the actual spoilers)

So here's what you do: when you are done typing your post, highlight whatever information you want to "hide", click the "+" and select Spoiler. You will get a pop-up that asks you to give the Spoiler a title. Type whatever you want!

This will add some spoiler code to the post you are composing, which will show up like this when you post the thread/reply

When you click it, you can see the contents

This is all well and good, but by default (meaning, the original Xenforo software) this is just hidden from view on your screen, but all the text "hidden behind" the Spoiler is still viewable by a robot or a search engine.

I've installed an add-on that makes the content of a Spoiler only viewable when you are logged in. So now, when someone (or more importantly, something) scrapes the site for content, they won't be able to pick up your email address, phone number, home address, etc...anything you don't want them to see. A robot will just see links to the registration/login page, and if it's an actual person surfing the info, they will just see this when they click the Spoiler

I strongly urge everyone to use this tool when posting your personal information in a publicly viewable thread.

Here is an actual Spoiler so you can see how it works - try logging out and clicking the button!

Spoiler: Clicky click me for more!!

Register or Login to view Spoiler content!

Only registered users who are logged in will be able to view Spoiler content - no robots or spammers will be able to get to it, unless they go through the effort of registering...and those are easy to spot because they're always from some weird country...

Also, note that use of the Spoiler is not really necessary in the Members forums, as these are not publicly viewable - all content in the Members area is only viewable to those who are not only registered, but also have a paid GIRS Membership.

 

More smilies coming too, as soon as I figure out that system....

 

Just a bump for everyone that you can use this to hide your email, phone, address, any information that you don't want unregistered users to be able to see.

For example:

Spoiler: Clicky!

Register or Login to view Spoiler content!

 

If you mean in a conversation / PM, yes, that is only seen by the participants

 

Bumping this thread: I see a lot of people posting their phone number and/or email address in a public thread...this is a bad idea IMO but hey, it's up to you I guess....