spam followers
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Hi there. I launched my site this weekend (meaning I changed settings so that public could view it, and sent some emails to friends to check it out.) over the course of 24 hours I rec’d about 30 email subscribers from odd looking email addresses. I got an email about each of them, but they do not show up in my wp notification msg bar. They ARE, however, in the list of followers. Should I be concerned about them? I know of only a few that are REAL subscribers and those don’t appear in the wp notification bar either. Thanks so much for your help. Becky
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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We cannot comment on what we cannot even see. Your email only followers are at this link https://wordpress.com/my-stats/?blog_subscribers&type=email
You will need to contact staff via
help@wordpress.com
and let them know exactly which email addresses concern you.Also know that we cannot block or delete any followers of Public blogs.
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Thank you timethief. I’m also seeing that WP lists 1 follower, but about 15 actually listed under the follow stats. Really strange. I’ll report that too.
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Perhaps I’ll provide more information before you do that.
Your WordPress.com followers are here https://wordpress.com/my-stats/?blog_subscribers and that number includes your Publicize followers.
Below is some associated information you may find useful.
Our stats are not real time stats and take time to update. There are frequent fluctuations that most do not notice because we aren’t watching the process. For details see here http://en.support.wordpress.com/stats/ and note the views and viewers take hours to update.
Our stats are page view stats. But please do not assume that everyone who clicks a follow, like, share, reblog or comment link actually reads the post on your blog because odds are they may not.
Follow, like, share, reblog or comment clicks are not page views. In fact, follows, likes, shares, comments and reblogs are completely misleading when you are talking about page view stats.
Your followers and anyone with a WordPress.com/Gravatar account who is logged into WordPress.com can “follow” your blog, “like”, “share” and “reblog” your posts and “comment” in several locations such as the Reader, without ever clicking into your blog and creating a single page view stat. Subscribers control how frequently they receive your posts (instantly, daily, weekly) and can comment without clicking into the blog.
Logged in visitors using a mobile can read the full post without creating a page view stat. https://en.forums.wordpress.com/topic/wordpresscom-reader-show-full-text?replies=31#post-1373606
You can control the length of the entry sent out on your RSS feed here Dashboard > Settings > Reading. Choose the “summary” setting for your RSS feed rather than to “full text”. That will compel followers who are not using mobiles to click into the blog to read the full post which will create a page view stat.
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Thanks. that makes sense. I’ll let help know the suspicious email addys. Appreciate your help!
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You’re welcome but do know that we cannot either block or delete any followers from any Public blog. Anyone and everyone can access public blogs and that’s indeed what the public designation means. However, please read this about public blogs that become private blogs > Blog Privacy and Subscribers > http://wpcommaven.wordpress.com/2011/09/05/blog-privacy-and-subscribers/
To change blog visibility to Private go to Dashboard > Settings > Reading scroll to Site Visibility and choose option 3
http://en.support.wordpress.com/settings/privacy-settings/You don’t need an upgrade of any kind at all to invite multiple people to contribute to a private blog. See:
adding users http://en.support.wordpress.com/adding-users/
user roles http://en.support.wordpress.com/user-roles/
Note that you have complete control over everything that’s posted to your blog via comment moderation
http://en.support.wordpress.com/settings/discussion-settings/#comment-moderationFor trolls, you can “blacklist” them at Settings > Discussion toward the bottom of that page. Enter their email address, their username, and if they included it, their website URL. That will automatically send them to moderation so that their comments do not appear on the blog. Do note though that if they are determined, they can use a different email address or username to get around that.
Also, do not put their IP address in the blacklist. IP addresses are no longer unique, and you might end up blocking legitimate visitors. In fact for over a decade only about 30% of us have IPs that trace back to any individual computer. Also, all they would have to do is go to a wi-fi hot spot, or connect via a different ISP and they could get around that.
Our reality is that if the ability to remove or followers existed our time would be squandered on removing unwanted followers because anyone can get a new email address and or a new IP in seconds flat and then they can subscribe again to any public blog they were removed from.
If someone has an inappropriate rating for a Gravatar image, please log into to Gravatar and use the “Report Abuse” link on their Gravatar profile bottom right hand corner to let Staff know.
Also note that on this page > Settings > Discussion if you scroll down you will find you can set a Maximum Rating for gravatar display on your blog.
G — Suitable for all audiences
PG — Possibly offensive, usually for audiences 13 and above
R — Intended for adult audiences above 17
X — Even more mature than aboveIf the follower has an inappropriate blog hosted here at WordPress.com, you can also report that to us so we can deal with that: Report Mature or Spam Blogs http://en.support.wordpress.com/report-blogs/
Please see this Staff reply concerning spam followers:
https://en.forums.wordpress.com/topic/a-follower-who-just-linked-my-blog?replies=31#post-2183095
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