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#14811 My Developers IP Flagged as Spammer

Posted in ‘Admin Tools for Joomla! 4 & 5’
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Environment Information

Joomla! version
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PHP version
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Admin Tools version
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Latest post by nicholas on Tuesday, 29 January 2013 01:56 CST

user67509

Mandatory information about my setup:

Have I read the related troubleshooter articles above before posting (which pages?)? YES
Have I searched the tickets before posting? Yes
Have I read the documentation before posting (which pages?)? YES
Joomla! version: 2.5.8
PHP version: (unknown)
MySQL version: (unknown)
Host: (optional, but it helps us help you)
Admin Tools version: Newest

Description of my issue:

Hi Nichoas!

Sorry, if this is already addressed in documentation, but I couldn't find it when searching under "spambot"

My developer's IP is flagged and when trying to login she get's

"Sorry, your login failed because you have been flagged as a spammer by a match of your details in our spambot database. If you are a genuine visitor, then we apologise. Please contact us to get the issue resolved."

I tried adding the IP to the Whitelist and turning off honeypot and these diod not work, Could you please help? The IP address is: [12:24:14 PM] simoid software: 124.253.6.217

Thank you,

 

Bill

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

It is documented, but it makes sense that you can't find your customised blocked IP message in our troubleshooter ;)

Your developer's IP got auto-banned. In order to allow him to access your site again you need to do the following:

  • Go to Components, Admin Tools, Auto IP Blocking Administration and remove the record with his IP
  • Go to Components, Admin Tools, Security Exceptions Log, filter by the IP address of your developer, select and Delete all records with his IP address.

On top of that you should add his IP to the whitelist so that he doesn't get auto-banned again.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user67509

Hi Nicholas!

Alright, the IP was no where to be found in Auto IP blocking, and as a mater of fact there were none as I have yey to turn that on. But I checked.

I found about 12 instances of the IP in the Security Exceptions log and deleted them.

I already added the IP to the white list and the developer tried it with me while on skype and it still didn't work. I did check to make sure it was added and it is on the list.

I really need this girl to get to work on the site, is deleting from the excetptions log all I should need to do? It was the only thing that wasn't already done.

Thanks Nicholas,

Bill

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

You must definitely remove the exception log entries. Moreover, if you are using the whitelist feature, make sure that her IP is in the whitelist, or disable the whitelist feature while she's working.

Other ideas:

  • Are you using Geographic IP blocking? If you do, disable it.
  • Are you using IP blacklisting? It's possible that you accidentally added her IP or an IP range which includes her IP. If in doubt, also disable the IP blacklisting while she's working on your site.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user67509

1. Not using Geographic IP blocking. But checked to make sure it wasn't activated or that my developers country was checked. So that couldn't have been it.

2. She wasn't added to the blacklist and is on the whitelist.

Trying to figure this out, but the only thing that I changed was deleting her IP address in the Security Exceptions log. But how did she find her way into the log to begin with? It's not making sense to me.

 

Bill

 

 

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

Hm, after those changes is she able to log in to the site? If not, what is the Reason that is reported in the Security Exceptions Log? The only other thing that comes to mind is that you're using the Project Honeypot integration and her IP has been (mistakenly) reported as a known spammer IP or that you are using the Bad Behaviour integration and it throws a false positive. Especially the latter is very probable if your developer has been using a user agent switcher and set it to the user agent of a search engine (common practice among developers trying to test how a search engine sees a site, but also among hackers who want to bypass security measures). 

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user67509

That's it then. None of the above apply. She did try and login several times with a bad url - no ?XXX. So perhaps her repeated login attempts did it?

Bill

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

We have ruled out every single feature in Admin Tools that can block someone's IP address. Try disabling the System - Admin Tools plugin. If the problem persists you have another security extension (component or plugin) installed on your site which is obviously outside the scope of our support.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user67509

Of course. I can't thank you enough and will make sure to post the resolution so all can benefit.

You're the best Nicholas!

Bill

user67509

All is well. The developer was able to logon and is working now. It must have been the failed login attempts is all I can think of. Thanks again Nicholas!

Bill

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

You're welcome, Bill!

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

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