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Lemmy exceeds million users (maybe more accurately accounts) (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 year ago by 1337tux@lemmy.world to c/fediverse@lemmy.ml
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Lemmy has multiplied it's number of users (maybe more accurately accounts) in just few days. How much do you think is the percentage of bot accounts? Is Lemmy having problem with bot farming?

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[-] Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social 0 points 1 year ago

Have all of the Lemmy instances (and kbin ones, too) now added email requirements, captcha, and maybe the little paragraph asking why you should have an account that Beehaw does?

Also, how do you identify bot accounts? Can you bulk ban accounts or.do they all have to be examined and dealt with individually?

ETA: I wasn't suggesting the paragraph. Just wondering what the instances are putting in to prevent bots. I actually tried to sign up for Beehaw, wrote my little paragraph, and then got the pinwheel of death, lol. I was never able to sign up, but lucked out with a kbin.social account. I have to add that it's pretty disappointing to be downvoted for simply asking a question. Feels like what I left at Reddit.

[-] funkyb@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

good grief i hope not. Email & captcha are reasonable; a short form essay on why you should be graced with the ability to participate is super cringe.

[-] rm_dash_r_star@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

Yeah I was a bit weirded out by that, it's like what, am I joining a cult? Anyway I actually signed up on a number of instances in search of one I like and only a couple were using an application. The rest were just captcha plus email.

I think they should come up with a better mechanism than an application. I understand the need to verify a signer is actually a human being, but an application is pretty off-putting. Problem is there's bots that can get around captcha and email authentication, AI keeps getting smarter.

[-] Amir@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

"ChatGPT, write me a paragraph about why I want to join an internet forum in first person"

[-] Sal@mander.xyz -1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It may be an AI, or it can also be a real human that is lying. The point of the application filter is to significantly slow down these approaches to bring their impact to a more manageable level. An automated AI bot will not be able to perform much better than a human troll with some free time because any anomalous registration patterns, including registration spikes and periodicity, are likely to be detected by the much more powerful processor that resides in the admin's head.

On the other hand, a catch-all domain e-mail, a VPN with a variable IP, and a captcha-defeating bot can be used to generate thousands of accounts in a very short amount of time. Without the application filter the instance is vulnerable to these high-throughput attacks, and the damage can be difficult to fix.

[-] DerWilliWonka@kbin.social 0 points 1 year ago

I wonder how people come up with the bot superstition? Just a feeling or is there any valid indication of massive influx of bot accounts?

[-] TheAngryBad@kbin.social 0 points 1 year ago

Experience, mainly.

I used to run a phpbb forum, on average the bot signups outnumbered the real people 10 or 20 times. And that was with some fairly robust anti spam measures in place - something I think this platform is too new to have properly sorted out yet.

I may be wrong, I don't know how the back end here works, but any place where people can post publicly will be infested with bot signups very quickly. The only real variable is how good the anti spam measures are.

[-] DerWilliWonka@kbin.social 0 points 1 year ago

What is something someone can gain by swarming an instance or forums like yours with bots? I cant wrap my head around it. Also if someone has an instance and swarms it with bot accounts, it may seem like you got a popular instance but where is the revenue if there are noone who is able to click an ad? Do they do it just for the lols?

[-] GizmoLion@kbin.social 0 points 1 year ago

Spin up 50 bots.
Sign them all up for lemmy.
Let accounts interact/age.
Sell accounts to companies who want to advertise as one of the cool kids.

Happened on reddit nonstop.

[-] realcaseyrollins@social.freetalklive.com 0 points 1 year ago
[-] fu@libranet.de 1 points 1 year ago

@realcaseyrollins @GizmoLion @1337tux @DerWilliWonka @TheAngryBad meaning you want to sell fedi accounts to capitalists?

[-] realcaseyrollins@social.freetalklive.com -1 points 1 year ago

@fu @GizmoLion @1337tux @DerWilliWonka @TheAngryBad I'm not on board with the selling part tbh, but I like the bot idea, it worked for #Reddit like the guy said

[-] GizmoLion@kbin.social 0 points 1 year ago

I feel like you're reading a completely different conversation...

[-] fu@libranet.de 0 points 1 year ago

@GizmoLion @realcaseyrollins @1337tux @DerWilliWonka @TheAngryBad its not likely, but with how the Fediverse works its possible, whether slow federation between certain servers (for example I frequently will have posts Friendica tells me have posted to 130/135 servers within a minute but those last few can take days or never post at all) also you guys might not both see the same conversation based on who you've blocked, or been blocked by, etc. If you ever want to verify, you should be able to view it on their instance (on Kbin this is what is listed under MORE as LINK TO FEDIVERSE)

[-] fu@libranet.de 0 points 1 year ago

@realcaseyrollins @GizmoLion @1337tux @DerWilliWonka @TheAngryBad if it's not a PUBLIC conversation of course you won't be able to see it on their server if you don't have an account on that server that is included in the private body (like Friendica's default of "friends only")

[-] GizmoLion@kbin.social -1 points 1 year ago

Looks like you are @ing someone I can't see.

Well, that's the first major point against this fediverse business... Who's going to stick around to have a conversation when everyone's only getting bits of it? That's kinda antithetical to discussion...

this post was submitted on 22 Jun 2023
2 points (100.0% liked)

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