Hey LiveJournal, SUSPEND the bot accounts!

[campylobacter]

The good thing about having an Open Journal is the Google signal boost my posts get -- especially fanfic.

The good thing about allowing anonymous comments is that I get to mess with trolls talk to folk who don't have an LJ.

The bad thing about an Open Journal is that spambots parasitize my SERP placement.

The bad thing about allowing anonymous comments is comment spam. Spammers' latest tactic is using the LJ email notification system to get around the "suspicious comment" screening; they post any random text (regardless of what language it's in) and sneak in a link to their spammy website that does NOT show up on your LJ because there's no anchor text, but DOES show up in your email.

They assume I'm gonna click it? SERIOUSLY? WTF? Do they get pay-per-click impressions? Or does merely visiting their spam site install malware on your computer? 

Here's the really sinister part: the spambot inserts an invisible image (1-pixel transparent GIF named "dot") inside the link; it's what LJ uses sitewide to track stats. The bots are hoping that hotlinking this LJ image will circumvent the Suspicious Comment screening. For the HTML nerds, here's the markup:
<br />Subject: Спасибо за информацию<br /><br /> Супер блог<a border="0" href="http://site-sex-znakomstva.ru/" ><img src="http://1-stat.livejournal.com/img/dot.gif" border="0"></a>

It's essentially taken LJ a year to finally delete some of these spambot accounts:

belannaa  
cesspacco   
liiclgvd  
nnbpjwsfmad1
omgitskylexd   
xoruspar  

But these spambot accounts are still active:
samm_on  derpiontisuko   
cevuleer  
celimood (I asked my F-List to report this thing a month ago, and it's still spamming! It even left a comment to my post. It's up to 251 spam comments across LJ so far. GET ON THIS, LiveJournal.)
wupospot  
cooleywac   
pomcroylufib  

I don't know, man. Is LJ letting these bot accounts stay undeleted so that they can inform us of the benefits of counterfeit erectile dysfunction medication? WTF LiveJournal? SpamHaus is gonna blacklist you again.

PS: Here are more spam accounts from the Spamhaus blacklist that LJ still HAS NOT DELETED. This batch is all about "f!lthy wh0res f*cking cow d!cks". Um, cows are female KTHXBAI.
iwzmcsbfsyw 
egyozgqetxb  
tayogtyjfb 
sdckgygeof2 
gtymzgsa2  
grabnkkjsy2 
ywepcdgsf12  
gebakitzwdy0 
cwiymtpny59  
sztkbfnfbk 
zdzqjoebfbj  
cikgstad 
xfxigmzzons3  
rotozmdejwg 
xmkpyatkqrx5  
ntgftrbydo 
xmzrjzgmk9  
zdwzpkkcg 
gkcseerfnp  
aritxwri7 
adouluge

Plus another 100 I'm not bothering to copy over here. :P

PPS:
Quick link to report a bot:
http://www.livejournal.com/abuse/bots.bml

Quick link to ban a user:
http://www.livejournal.com/manage/banusers.bml

Comments

[jennickels.livejournal.com]

I must not be cool enough. I don't get spam or trolls (except for spilleta's super psycho troll friend).

I do have to say I LOVE that pic and the caption.

[campylobacter.livejournal.com]

Trollypants must be afraid of me, because it's only left maybe 4 or 5 meek little anon comments, and hasn't poked its trollbutt here since its endspam account got deleted. I kinda miss it. :( I've worked hard to get my LJ highly visible; using Tumblr tags & auto-Tweets with cross-posting to Dreamwidth has really boosted my Google rank. I've also noticed that spambots love to spam entries that have 10+ comments, especially if at least half of them are from different users.

And yup, Shanks's face in that convention photo is pretty freakin' epic. :D