My business has been up since January, but officially open to the public since the first of October. Well, ever since I have opened it up, people (from WHT mainly since I haven't done a great deal of advertising yet) have been signing up with fake domain names using fake information ... opening up live help sessions and leaving, or even harassing operators in live chat. The false signups arent fraudulent; the people signing up just sign up and never come back, so its not a matter of fraud as much as it is a prank.

I know this will be a factor as long as I am a host because there are immature people everywhere ... whether I like it or not.

The purpose of this thread is to inquire whether as to there are steps I can take to discourage these fake signups, prevent them, or reduce the number of them.

So, hosts with more time spent in the field ... what do you do in situations like this? Grin and bear it? IP ban the violators, contact them (if applicable), or just forget it?

It isn't a huge deal, but like I said, I would like to be able to do something about it If i am able to.

Thanks,
-Sam

Maybe I'm confused.. you say they're signing up with false domain names using fake information yet the orders aren't fraudulent? So they're signing up and creating accounts but then not paying for services? I'm not being critical, I just honestly don't understand.

You could employ manual checks of the accounts, if you're currently allowing your system to automatically create them. It will take more time but in the end it will really help curb the issues.

Automated phone call verification is one of your options. If you're using modernbill, you can add fraudguardian which will prevent people from submitting false information.

You could employ manual checks of the accounts, if you're currently allowing your system to automatically create them. It will take more time but in the end it will really help curb the issues.


This is what we do. Each order placed also records the IP. If something is fishy about the tracert of the IP or the volume they order...its usually pretty obvious. If its a good order, we simply validate and provission the services on the server.

Good luck!

We're about to implement the auto phone verification system. It's rediculous that we get these fraud issues come thru, and then our merchant blaming us for them. It's their responsibility to tell us if a card is good or bad, dont try to turn the table on us, it wont work.

No no, I have fraud services that work well. (MaxMind).

CE has many options for that, including telephone verification services (from MaxMind).

What I am talking about, are people that fill out the signup form with their name as like 'asdfdasfsda' and submit the order with all spam information and dont pay & never show up again.

Its not a serious problem, but its annoying.

Log the IP of the "kiddy" and put a rule in your firewall?

You may be getting hit with "form" or "comment" spam. You'll need image verification to prevent the forms being submitted without the image verification being entered.

And banning IPs isn't going to help in the long run. You end up banning hundreds of PCs behind a business firewall or home users after they renew their IPs.

If the IP continually affends then so be it but not once or twice!

We have this problem from time to time. Just have to ignore it, I guess.

I think the telephone-call fraud detection service would help deter it the most, becuase they cant complete the signup unless they verify the number given by the robot on the phone. People wouldnt go that far if they were just screwing with us.