Nicholas M Ong

Have you ever wondered who was registering at your blog? With user names like ‘jdutefnkeleys17‘ and similar email addresses like ‘jdutefnkeleys17@gmail.com‘, it makes me wonder if it a SPAM bot or a real human. In most cases, it’s a bot.

WordPress has many anti-SPAM built in features on it’s own. Aksimet for one is a great plugin with regular updates to combat the evolving SPAM bots. This plugin is of course a standard inclusion in any copy of WordPress installation. Then there is the Dashboard where blog owners can control who is able to leave comments. By selecting only logged in users, your readers who do not wish to register on your blog will not be able to leave any comments. However, as soon as you set comments to free for all, you have inevitably opened the flood gates for SPAM bots. if you don’t quite get the effects of this, look at the image on the bottom right corner of this blog and your will see how spam bots have been blocked since 2 months back.

So what can you do about it? Simple, by using a plugin to secure your comment form, you add a small image on the page to combat SPAM bots. Unless the image is entered into the box provided, no registration can take place. Cryptographp is one such plugin. Using the same principle of a Captcha  image, this plugin blocks SPAM bots out.

How does this benefit your readers? Cryptographp only requires them to key in the images in the box provided. Compared to having to registering, waiting for activation email, logging in on your blog before they can even place a comment, this plugin is a straight-forward and simple tool to use.

• Cryptographp: Secure your comments form with a random image to combat SPAM bots. Place the code “<?php display_cryptographp(); ?>“  on your comment form in your WordPress installation “comments.php”.

If you prefer not to tinkle with codes on your blog, Simple CAPTCHA does the job without additional features and customisation.

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