Restrict #cockpit IRC channel to registered Freenode users

[Martin Pitt]

Hello all,

we've had another wave of spambot attachs in #cockpit last night and this
morning. They keep coming every few weeks. Today's one was mild, but the
previous one was quite unbearable (dozens of really offensive lines every
minute). When they happen, there's no defence, as the traditional /kickban does
not work against botnets with wildly different IP addresses.

Therefore I propose to do what many other Freenode channels have done years ago
and restrict #cockpit to registered Freenode users. In technical terms, set
channel mode +M [1].

Any objections? Is anyone in the team currently not registered with Freenode?

Thanks,

Martin

[1] https://wiki.swiftirc.net/wiki/Channel_modes#.2BM_2

[Stephen Gallagher]

On Wed, Aug 1, 2018 at 2:03 AM Martin Pitt  wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> we've had another wave of spambot attachs in #cockpit last night and this
> morning. They keep coming every few weeks. Today's one was mild, but the
> previous one was quite unbearable (dozens of really offensive lines every
> minute). When they happen, there's no defence, as the traditional /kickban
> does
> not work against botnets with wildly different IP addresses.
>
> Therefore I propose to do what many other Freenode channels have done
> years ago
> and restrict #cockpit to registered Freenode users. In technical terms, set
> channel mode +M [1].
>
> Any objections? Is anyone in the team currently not registered with
> Freenode?

If you go this route, please add content to the
https://github.com/cockpit-project/cockpit/wiki/About page to tell people
which hoops they need to jump through in order to be able to access the
channel or you're going to be locking out new potential users and
contributors.

[Martin Pitt]

Hello Stephen,

Stephen Gallagher [2018-08-01  7:56 -0400]:
> If you go this route, please add content to the
> https://github.com/cockpit-project/cockpit/wiki/About page to tell people
> which hoops they need to jump through in order to be able to access the
> channel or you're going to be locking out new potential users and
> contributors.

Done, thanks for pointing out!

Pitti

[Martin Pitt]

Hello again,

Martin Pitt [2018-08-01  8:01 +0200]:
> Therefore I propose to do what many other Freenode channels have done years ago
> and restrict #cockpit to registered Freenode users. In technical terms, set
> channel mode +M [1].

+r actually for Freenode, sorry [1].

As the spamming still keeps going on, I now made these modifications:

- #cockpit is now restricted to registered users (+r)
 - #cockpit now does not appear in the global channel list any more (-s)
 - trying to join #cockpit as an unregistered user redirects to the new
   ##cockpit-unregistered, whose topic says:

You need to be a registered Freenode user to join #cockpit. Please register by following the instructions at http://freenode.net/kb/answer/registration

[1] https://freenode.net/kb/answer/channelmodes

Please speak up if this causes trouble for anyone.

Thanks,

Martin

[Martin Pitt]

Hello again,

Martin Pitt [2018-08-01 14:29 +0200]:
> #cockpit is now restricted to registered users (+r)

I removed the flag again. The current spam wave uses authenticated users, so
this doesn't help. And some people have trouble joining.

At least we now have the redirect in place, so we can quickly turn +r back on
when the next spam wave happens (the previous ones were unauthenticated).

Martin