Board errors

[Lērisama]

Interestingly, I haven't (touch wood) had any problems accessing the forum since bots were banned, even though the number of guests strongly implies that the measure isn't having an effect. Have I been lucky thusfar, or are other people experiencing this too?

Literally just this moment I’m getting a 429 Too Many Requests error.

The errors returned to me too, just after I posted that. Because of course they did.

[Travis B.]

I was getting lots of 429 Too Many Requests errors earlier this morning myself.

[zompist]

I've denied read access to guests.

I purged sessions, so I'm not sure why we have guests, but hopefully all they can do is ask for the front page.

[Raphael]

I've denied read access to guests.

I purged sessions, so I'm not sure why we have guests, but hopefully all they can do is ask for the front page.

Right now, the Board software tells me that there are 119 guests looking at Ephemera. How can that be?

[Raphael]

I've denied read access to guests.

I purged sessions, so I'm not sure why we have guests, but hopefully all they can do is ask for the front page.

Right now, the Board software tells me that there are 119 guests looking at Ephemera. How can that be?

Still dozens of guests looking at Ephemera, and I keep getting "Too Many Requests" messages. The new rules seem to have had no effect at all.

[malloc]

When trying to view this site on my laptop, I get an error page saying "Not Acceptable! An appropriate representation of the requested resource could not be found on this server. This error was generated by Mod_Security". The site currently works for me on my phone, though.

Investigating further, it seems the choice of browser makes a difference. The site works on Chrome but not Firefox.

[Lērisama]

When trying to view this site on my laptop, I get an error page saying "Not Acceptable! An appropriate representation of the requested resource could not be found on this server. This error was generated by Mod_Security". The site currently works for me on my phone, though.

I got the same error on my phone. The new rules do seem to be ineffective.

Edit: Zomp's comment about htaccess on the blog post about this sent me down a rabbit hole. Would the htaccess file this poject has come up with be any use? I don't actually know anything useful about htaccess, so it might not work for our situation, but I'm posting anyway because I am completely fed up of bot induced errors.

[zompist]

On the plus side, I've been able to access the board, with far fewer problem. It was unusable earlier this week.

But I've reverted the guests change for now, just in case it caused the latest problem.

The "Not acceptable" error is apparently tied to mod_security and shouldn't be affected by anything in phpBB. But let's see what happens.

[lurker]

Haven't done a search to see if this has been suggested, but have you thought about changing the DNS host to Cloudflare and taking advantage of the DDoS protection? There's a modicum of support at the free tier. The CBB seems to have done just that in response to similar problems.

[Travis B.]

The DDOS-by-AI problems are acting up again...

[Raphael]

Still a lot of guests, but I haven't seen any errors today so far.

[Richard W]

When trying to view this site on my laptop, I get an error page saying "Not Acceptable! An appropriate representation of the requested resource could not be found on this server. This error was generated by Mod_Security". The site currently works for me on my phone, though.

Investigating further, it seems the choice of browser makes a difference. The site works on Chrome but not Firefox.

I've found weird security effects from Firefox while it crashes. It takes a long time for Firefox to finish crashing; it might be attempting to establish a crash report based on the gigabyes of memory it has mapped, so 'simply' closing down Firefox might have fixed the problem.

[zompist]

FWIW it's been better this week but problems do occur.

I will probably try the htaccess thing, though I'm not at all comfortable with that sort of thing. Does anyone know how to check where those guests are coming from? (Like, don't just say "there must be a log somewhere", provide the name of the file.)

[Travis B.]

I can confirm that I indeed can read the Zeeb while logged out right now.

[Raphael]

It takes a long time for Firefox to finish crashing; it might be attempting to establish a crash report based on the gigabyes of memory it has mapped,

Yikes! That explains some things. Thank you for the heads-up!

[Mornche Geddick]

I can confirm that I indeed can read the Zeeb while logged out right now.

Ditto. I noted 90 guests just now.

[Halian]

I would prefer to see pruning abolished.

Pruning wouldn't do anything about the bot problem.

Non sequitur. My stance on pruning has nothing to do with the bot problem.

One thing to note is that the recent error messages have had a consistent theme of too many requests and there have been excessive numbers of guests reported by the Zeeb, clearly indicating that bot activity is the problem.

Petty as it may sound, this only redoubles my hatred of AI.

Same.

FWIW it's been better this week but problems do occur.

I will probably try the htaccess thing, though I'm not at all comfortable with that sort of thing. Does anyone know how to check where those guests are coming from? (Like, don't just say "there must be a log somewhere", provide the name of the file.)

Xkeeper, the owner of The Cutting Room Floor, has seen the amount of bogus traffic crash after blackholing Alibaba Cloud. Suggest doing the same here. If possible, it may behoove you to set up Anubis.

[bradrn]

If possible, it may behoove you to set up Anubis.

Link for the curious: https://anubis.techaro.lol/

That said, I’m not sure if zompist would have the ability to set up such a thing using Dreamhost.

[Travis B.]

If possible, it may behoove you to set up Anubis.

Link for the curious: https://anubis.techaro.lol/

That said, I’m not sure if zompist would have the ability to set up such a thing using Dreamhost.

If you can, zompist, I would suggest setting up this. From looking into it, it is definitely a better option for the open Internet than Cloudflare.

[Raphael]

By now, I kind of think that it's a nice testimony to the general attractiveness of the ZBB that people keep posting posts here each day despite the fact that that's so difficult to do.