Newbie question about cheaters
 

I want to start accepting submissions from free site builders. However I always see warnings about cheaters on other webmasters submission forms.
Could someone tell me what I should be watching for?
Thanks.

you should be watching for cheaters :D

seriously though people re-direct alot IE once a site is listed they re-direct to a paysite.... people multi-submit and try like hell to hide it.... some people change sites after they are listed to add viruses/spyware, remove the content, add tons of outgoing links etc... and there are a bunch of ways that people cheat but LL owners aren't gonna explain in public how they track them down or the cheaters will know how they are being busted and will come up with new ways to try and cheat :D

well not that I'm any expert, you realize... :D

but I think there are a few things you can do to minimize your risk until you get a good feel for stuff:

-is the site listed with the other LLs that have their recips on it? (keeping in mind it takes a while some times to get listed) & is it the same url that you have had submitted? Is the site (or a mirror) listed at any of the bigger LLs?
-check the BL - is the url/email/domain listed on there?
-check the cheaters forum - you will be able to get a nice list of (possible hehe) cheaters, make your own DB & check it when you get a new submitter
-check the whois info, is there anything funny there?
I always check the board here to see if the person is a member too - doesn't mean they're not a cheater, but at least you'd know where to find them :D
-if you're not sure, give it a few days then check the site again, see if anything has changed (ie redirects, recips taken down etc)

I don't think any of these things are big secrets, and are easily done so I would start with that.

I'm not so experienced that I can spot some of the sophisticated stuff, but I follow the board really closely & hopefully I will get better at it.

PS - it's easier if you're getting less than 20 submits a day :D

So if anyone has any other tips, it would be appreciated! :)

Ponygirl

to get/write the rigth script will help you a lot

I'm actually thinking about writing my own script - I'd have to start from scratch, but I have way too much time on my hands anyway :D

Thanks to every one for the tips.

Oh - can I have some?
It seems to be my fate that I always have much more to do than I have time - I should seriously consider to stop sleeping - 7 hours wasted each day!

that's the trick right there! ;)
sleep is highly overrated anyway, and besides, anyone who's ever had kids can tell you how to get 15 refreshing minutes of deep sleep standing up while making peanut butter sandwiches :D

Ponygirl

I had a LL once, I built it during two weeks while learning PHP coming from Perl experience. It collapsed.

- Buy a nice LL management system or spend more than two weeks working on your own. Your list must be maintained like a garden. If the lady bugs start eating your tomatoes then you have to delete all the ladybug's submissions.

- View the free site's HTML and look for similaries. Multi-submitters are not smart enough to employ different indentation techniques among templates.

- Look at directory stucture. They usually don't vary that either. Look at the names of images. Style sheets.