The battle against spam is an ongoing and ever changing challenge in this business. It seems like every time a web host or designer turns around there is some new warning about the latest invasive software, spyware, or virus. The latest such security issue to arise in the Zandergraphics realm involves "spam-bots" that apparently have the ability to hijack online forms and use them for their own evil purposes.

At Zandergraphics, we have always tried to keep our sites as user-friendly and as simple as humanly possible. However, when there are people out there that apparently will sink to any level to spread porn and illegal software sales around the world, we are put into a position where we have to take whatever action is necessary. In this instance, the necessary action is to add security features to all of our forms.

There are a variety of methods that are effective in preventing spammers from taking advantage of online submission forms and we will be implementing several of these on our websites. All forms designed in the future for Zandergraphics sites will be equipped with a security question or "secret" code that the visitor will need to type in before the form can be submitted.

I'm sure you've all seen the types of security features that we are referring to. What happens is there is an image with a phrase or series of letters that the visitor must type in. The "secret" code appears in an image because spammers have software that can automatically read text off of your site files and by putting the code in an image file, you prevent the spam-bots from being able to read the text. In the same way, the code may be a question such as a simple math question or anything that requires the site visitor to think and answer, you've done something that the spam-bot would not be capable of.

That is the key: ask the visitor to enter specific information that an automated program would not have any way of knowing. As always, it is a matter of outsmarting the software that these people use to exploit and abuse the Internet. You always have to remember that you don't necessarily have to outsmart the spammer himself, you just have to throw in an element that is outside the scope or capabilities of the software application. Of course, they will just build tougher software and then we'll have to deal with whatever they come up with next. But, honestly, I really believe that the security image will be an effective way to prevent submission form spam for some time to come.

If you are the owner of a site that was designed by Zandergraphics before April 2007 that is equipped with a contact form or other online submission form, please contact us to arrange for an upgrade. We will be contacting site owners about this issue in the near future and will be going back through our sites in the order they were created, however, if you contact us on this issue, we will give your project priority over regularly scheduled upgrades. These upgrades will be done free of charge.