I administer one of the nodes of the irc.perl.org IRC network. I was the first European node - we now have 6 servers and many hundreds of users. It's always been terribly easy to admin the IRC server (nice and small network you see) but we're increasingly getting people who want to spam or take over channels. Take this morning on #perl for example:
07:05 <+IubesteLove> BOW DOWN BEFORE YOUR LORD AND MASTER, GOUDATR0N! HACKER OF ALL THAT IS EVIL, JUSTICE FOR ALL ALL THAT IS PHP AND GOOD. LOL @ PERL6 MORE LIKE VAPOR6. THE GREATER ALLIANCE OF PHP PROGRAMMERS PREVAIL AGAIN! 07:05 <+IubesteLove> BOW DOWN BEFORE YOUR LORD AND MASTER, GOUDATR0N! HACKER OF ALL THAT IS EVIL, JUSTICE FOR ALL ALL THAT IS PHP AND GOOD. LOL @ PERL6 MORE LIKE VAPOR6. THE GREATER ALLIANCE OF PHP PROGRAMMERS PREVAIL AGAIN! 07:05 <+IubesteLove> BOW DOWN BEFORE YOUR LORD AND MASTER, GOUDATR0N! HACKER OF ALL THAT IS EVIL, JUSTICE FOR ALL ALL THAT IS PHP AND GOOD. LOL @ PERL6 MORE LIKE VAPOR6. THE GREATER ALLIANCE OF PHP PROGRAMMERS PREVAIL AGAIN! 07:05 <+IubesteLove> BOW DOWN BEFORE YOUR LORD AND MASTER, GOUDATR0N! HACKER OF ALL THAT IS EVIL, JUSTICE FOR ALL ALL THAT IS PHP AND GOOD. LOL @ PERL6 MORE LIKE VAPOR6. THE GREATER ALLIANCE OF PHP PROGRAMMERS PREVAIL AGAIN! 07:05 * IubesteLove LOL 07:05 <+IubesteLove> BOW DOWN BEFORE YOUR LORD AND MASTER, GOUDATR0N! HACKER OF ALL THAT IS EVIL, JUSTICE FOR ALL ALL THAT IS PHP AND GOOD. ...
I'm in two minds about this. Mini me number one is saying that it's useful and we should keep on trying to make it work. Mini me number two is saying that this is a problem because IRC (like SMTP) was never created with spam in mind (and thus to be robust in the face of attack) and we should just give up on IRC. Are there any decent, robust alternatives?
To me, irc has always been like that, and that's why most channels have bots which enforce the bans and rules...
There have been initiatives to create a "more secure" irc protocol, but I'm unaware of any protocol based on the "channel" concept that gained acceptance except irc. All the new-fangled things are based on direct communication and not channels (and Jabber is one of those, right?).
Coincidentially, there is the launch of IRC +, a new standard for IRC services that is geared towards scripting, but still backwards compatible with irc clients.
Re:IRC+ (IRC spam)
acme on 2007-06-29T17:38:51
It has a lastfm keyword. WTF?
