I am writing this post in anticipation of the question: Why bbProtection? Why not simply write a MOD for phpBB (or insert-board-here) using the Akismet API instead? It’s a fair question, and one that I think should be reviewed. After all, if someone else has already done the hard work, why not reuse it?
For those of you who aren’t aware, Londonvasion 2008 was phpBB’s first conference style event. Our very own Dave Rathbun presented about the spam problem facing board owners and his attempts to try and prevent it.
The presentation is well worth a watch and is also downloadable from the Londonvasion page, under the [08] phpBB Spam header.
Dave explains a little more about the content of the presentation over at his blog, so go and check it out 
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Well, where to start… I’m Vic D’Elfant, in charge of the development of bbProtection for both the first beta and the new, upcoming version. Apart from my team position here at bbProtection, I’m also a member of the phpBB Development Team and run a software company in the Netherlands, Coronis.
It is very exciting to work on a project like bbProtection, for a number of reasons: its purpose (fighting spam!), its scale (huge!) and the possibility of this taking really off and becoming a very successful project. This has a very motiving effect and will certainly keep my team and myself going. I personally learned a lot during the early beta days of bbProtection, but this will be covered in a future blog post by either Mark or yours truly.
Spam: We’re still on the lookout for new developers. We can only do “so much”, and we would really welcome some enthusiastic (and not to be forgotten, knowledgeable) people to join the development team. As per our abuse of Uncle Sam on the bbprotection.net placeholder page: we need you to help us, which eventually helps… you. If you are interested, please email to the relaunch email address found on the placeholder page, or drop me a line at IRC; my username is Vic on irc.freenode.net.
Hello, I’m Mark and I am currently involved in re-starting the bbProtection project.
Many of you will know me by my username MarkTheDaemon both on phpBB.com and other related fora. I’ve been involved with phpBB since mid 2005 when I set up my first phpBB2 forum. In 2006 I joined the phpBB MOD Team and to date I am still on the phpBB team.
I was also involved in the first beta of bbProtection, mainly in a support and documentation role. This time around I am more involved with the PR side of the project, bringing delights such as this blog so you are able to read about and comment on our progress.
The main reason why I originally got involved with the project was to fight the spam problem that we had then, and even more so now. A service such as bbProtection can go a long way to stopping spam that continually angers board owners, due to the time it takes to filter out, edit and remove the offending posts and users.
My nick on IRC is also MarkTheDaemon and I look forward to talking with you about the bbProtection service .
I’m known either as drathbun (on phpBB.com and some boards) or Dave Rathbun (on other boards). I started my first phpBB board in 2002 soon after the initial release of the 2.x line. I think I got my first spammer a few months later. 
I have been writing MODs and testing strategies to combat spam ever since.
I joined the moderator team at phpBB.com about two and a half years ago. During my time on the team I have seen spammer attacks on the board as well as major improvements that phpBB3 has provided. But I don’t think that phpBB3 and its new features will be enough. I have seen some very creative spammer techniques that a service like bbProtection can help prevent. As such, I am quite excited to have been invited to join the team here.
In real life I work as a database consultant and have been working in that area for over 18 years. I don’t do DBA work anymore, but I do enjoy applying my skills at design and optimization to phpBB MODs. I am still running the first board I started which now has over 32K users and 440K posts… running a highly modified version of phpBB2 at this point and still going strong. I blog about phpBB (and other things occasionally) at the phpBBDoctor blog, and I have a few other phpBB-related sites that you can probably find with a little help from google. In my spare time I wonder what I would do if I had any spare time. 
Most of you probably know me as Noxwizard. I’m a member of the phpBB.com Support Team, and now a developer for bbProtection. I joined the project soon after it launched, but only as a user. Now I’m here to help in its revival.
Some background about myself. I’m a student at Texas A&M University, and am working on my computer science degree. When I’m not doing phpBB related stuff, I’m either coding something, or playing a game.
It’s time to find out who is actually turning this idea into a reality . Over the next series of blog posts various team members will be introducing themselves and letting you know a little bit about them and why they are involved in the project.
Remember that many of the people introduced will be located in our IRC channel, so feel free to pop in and chat to us about bbProtection .
Those around for our first beta back in 2006 may remember the #bbprot IRC channel located on the Freenode network (irc.freenode.net) as a place for discussion between users and the team.
We’ve re-launched the IRC channel and welcome any and all of you that might have some time to pop in and chat with us. We really do want your feedback, ideas, and concerns on how you think the service could be improved as we prepare for our official re-launch.
For those of you who don’t use IRC, Wikipedia has an excellent tutorial regarding IRC use specifically on the Freenode network. Our channel is an open door, so simply connect to irc.freenode.net with your favourite IRC client and type “/join #bbprot” to join the party.
There will be a number of team members in the channel so drop in and chat to us about your thoughts on how we can make the service the best it can be .
bbProtection is a new type of anti-spam service designed especially with bulletin board systems in mind. It works with the “a rising tide lifts all boats” motto; as users report the spammers the service becomes more effective.
In December 2006 we launched the service with an open beta, but unfortunately it was terminated due to a lack of manpower and resources available at that time. However, we are happy to report that we are currently in the planning stages of relaunching the bbProtection service.
Our core concepts have not changed from the first beta period; we want to make an anti-spam service that is highly effective and allows users to concentrate on running their boards and not dealing with spam. We are taking the ideas and concepts that we learnt from our first beta and using them to build a better and more powerful service.
We hope that this blog will become the mouthpiece from which various team members speak about the road to our launch. We’ll be posting items that are still a working progress and welcome your feedback to create the best service for tackling the issues of spam that we have today.