Author Topic: Tools & Information for room hosts to hinder chat spam & proxy users (Read 28064 times)

silicon_toad2000 · « **Reply #40 on:** March 31, 2013, 12:40:59 am »

cool thanks for the clarification

Pri · « **Reply #41 on:** April 01, 2013, 08:42:24 pm »

I have a brand new version of the Proxy Blocker that I hope to release later this week. It is finished and I have a few people testing it in their rooms but if you would like to be involved in the beta and speed up its release you are more than welcome to PM me and I will send you a copy of the new version. Right now it has no bugs but that is why we are testing it.

I don't want to describe what the new feature is right now but it is brand new and very unique, something people have never tried before and it tightly integrates with the server you are using to tackle Proxy Servers before they enter your room. To use this new feature and be a part of the Beta you must be using either WCS or RSWCS. People using FXServe, Ouka or eServe need not apply as this feature does not work on those servers.

For anyone else wondering, the new Proxy Blocker will still work on all those servers I just listed but this new feature within the Proxy Blocker will not.

Thanks for reading

Pri · « **Reply #42 on:** April 06, 2013, 03:49:16 pm »

A new version of the Proxy Blocker has been posted: http://www.mxpulse.com/board/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=194

The feature I discussed in the post above this one in vague detail has not been included in this version of Proxy Blocker because it is simply too complicated for room owners to use effectively and it wasn't that great at stopping the spam anyway.

This new version posted today allows you to specify a password inside a text file (C:\Pri.Script.Dependencies\Proxy.Blocker\.forcelogin.password.ini) and once a user enters and is verified as not using a proxy they will be logged in with the password in that file. This uses the /forcelogin command which means it supports FXServe, WCS and RSWCS.

This version of the Proxy Blocker also supports Automatic Self Updating meaning the script is able to download future updates to itself automatically without the host of the room needing to go to the website and downloading the file and yadda yadda you get the gist. This feature is an optional extra and to use it you need to install wget but the website has instructions on how to do that and a nice download link. If you choose not to install wget you will continue to receive the normal update notifications like you have always done in the past.

Thanks.

Pri · « **Reply #43 on:** April 17, 2014, 08:51:59 am »

A new version of the proxy blocker v1.6.1 was released today. It uses a completely rewritten API (Proxy API v2). It no longer uses winmxunlimited.net for any of its functions, everything including the pre-emptive ban system and proxy checking has been moved to MXPulse. This is due to Josh working on other projects that he is more excited about, I'm still excited about security so I have taken over the proxy blocking API development.

The new API as of this message has over 200,000 Proxy servers on record just from what it scanned in the past 24 hours. It's the fastest API written so far for this usage and can support searching through millions of IP Addresses for detection.

But most importantly this version of the Proxy Blocker client is 2x faster at querying the API. The analytics discussed in the earlier part of this thread have also been adjusted positively for users.

In the old version if a proxy server was detected entering a channel the client would send a second query to an analytical API detailing the room name, IP Address and Username of the proxy user who entered. The new version doesn't perform this second query and instead tacks on the channel name on its original IP Check query. I no longer receive the usernames of people at any point even if they are using a Proxy Server to enter your channel, I only get their IP.

I found that collecting the usernames of proxies that entered your room didn't really help that much in finding where proxies came from. The only thing it provided me was insight as to why certain rooms were being attacked but that is outside of the scope of why I wanted the data, to find the websites where users gained proxies. So in the new version I removed the name sending completely.

The new version can be downloaded here: http://www.mxpulse.com/board/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=194

It does include some other new features such as a verbose mode, signed API responses for security and a key system which I may use in the future to give WinMX users precedent when accessing the API over other types of API queries. But really the main feature here is speed, the 2x faster querying has meant that in my testing it can kick and ban a proxy entering your room in under 250ms, of course your mileage may vary and the closer you are to the API (Hosted in UK) the faster it will boot proxies out.

I wanted to make this update here just so people know I am still working on it, this and all my other software is still being updated as are their associated web services

GhostShip · « **Reply #44 on:** April 17, 2014, 08:26:39 pm »

Welcome news for many I'm sure

Excellent news Pri, its good to know that our community is being taken care of still on many fronts

Pri · « **Reply #45 on:** April 19, 2014, 12:34:22 pm »

I just wanted to make a quick note. In really poor timing my internet died mid-day on Thursday and was repaired by an engineer today. So anyone who was using the Proxy Blocker and wondering why this new version wasn't working, it was due to the online API being inaccessible. This is I believe the 2nd longest downtime for my internet connection since I've ever had it. I do host the API currently from my home server but I have over 150Mb/s of internet at home, more than adequate for hosting this service.

I had the opportunity to have the line repaired yesterday (Friday) which would have meant only about 24 hours of downtime instead of 48, but I had a prior engagement that I couldn't reschedule so I had to have the engineer come today instead.

I apologize for the inconvenience, I did put up a notice on our websites home page and in the forums but I'm sure some people didn't see those or make the connection between those messages and the Proxy Blocker not functioning.

The good news is everything is now working properly and with the internet faster than ever (182Mb/s now) I'm sure everything will be just fine from here on out. Thank you for your patience

silicon_toad2000 · « **Reply #46 on:** April 19, 2014, 01:20:55 pm »

Nice work Pri

Pri · « **Reply #47 on:** August 30, 2014, 12:59:56 pm »

Version 3 of the Proxy API went live yesterday. This one adds features including a low-level caching system for recent detections to speed up querying and a new level based detection system.

LVL0 = Cache of the last 5 Minutes of positive hits (Usually <100 Entries)
LVL1 = TOR Check (2.5K Entries as of this post)
LVL2 = SOCKS4/5/Web Check (112K Entries as of this post)
LVL3 = Compromised Servers (128K Entries as of this post)
LVL4 = Direct connection is established to the IP and common proxy ports are tested for an active proxy server

With the new LVL4 added it is now able to physically test if a proxy is active on the IP being queried without needing to have prior knowledge of it. It literally connects to the IP Address like a proxy user would and tests if it can retrieve access to the internet through it.

The way the levels are staggered is for performance with the fastest checks being performed first and the slowest checks last. Obviously the LVL4 check takes the longest to perform as it must check many different port numbers and free and open proxy servers often have high latency which slows the check down.

If you're using Proxy Blocker v1.6.1 or 1.6.2 (They are the previous and current releases) you will automatically be using the v3 API by the time this post is made as these clients automatically download the API querying URL from my servers. If you have any issues running this software, would like a feature added or a bug fixed don't hesitate to contact me either through this forum, my own forum or my chat room on WinMX.

Pri · « **Reply #48 on:** January 09, 2016, 02:31:29 pm »

The Proxy Blocker API was updated about a week ago. It now detects VPN's VPS's and Dedicated Servers. Since no one is actually sitting or living in a data centre these are considered proxies if you're using them on WinMX.

It has been a long time coming to add this feature. Now of course I'm aware many rooms on WinMX use dedicated servers for various reasons and many users choose to use VPN's for privacy. I'm not dictating you to stop using these to access rooms that use Proxy Blocker. Please simply PM me your static IP from your VPN, VPS or Dedi and I will whitelist it immediately in the API which will within a few minutes unblock your IP. I've already whitelisted many servers on request, it is no trouble at all to do it for you.

Alternatively if you only want to be unblocked in your own room and not winmx wide you can use the in-room !proxypardon <ip> command which will allow you access to your own room when using your VPN, VPS or Dedicated Server.