More Weird Likes/Follows

  • genemonkey · Member ·

    None of mine appear in my follower list, does that mean developers are already onto it?

  • gemmacevans · Staff ·

    Thanks everyone, I’m continuing to pass on the information you’ve posted here.

  • trailhiker · Member ·

    Assuming that the gemmacevans post means you would indeed like new follower email names, here’s this morning’s (at the more civilized hour of 6:35am my time):
    (email visible only to moderators and staff)

  • gemmacevans · Staff ·

    Hi trailhiker,

    There’s no need to send each new address from now on but thanks for everything you’ve given me so far :) Our developers have your username and can find the information they need from looking that up.

  • laurieh111 · Member ·

    I am having the same problem. The emails that I get look like they are from WordPress, but they don’t show up in my email followers list. I got another 4 questionable emails this morning.

  • breckb104 · Member ·

    Kudos to WordPress for dealing with this annoyance!!!

    I would like one clarification… if I see the spam follower was “added” via an email from WordPress, but I don’t see them as a Follower in the list of email subscribers, can I correctly assume that WordPress removed them and they will not be a threat to my blog or to anyone following my blog ? I have been watching for the 6 recent “followers” to show in my list of followers and they have not appeared.

  • meowzyqrush · Member ·

    I am having a similar issue. I have seen past threads dating back to January 2018 about a similar issue, but mine is slightly different. I don’t have very many followers so I can easily figure out who visits my blog when and where.

    March 24, 2018 – (one visitor was recorded in my stats on March 24) Got an email in my gmail saying new outlook subscriber started following my blog via email. New outlook subscriber visited one blog post (newest) from the USA (not unusual location for me). Stats say the referrer was WordPress.com Reader. Subscriber not show up in my email followers list.

    March 25, 2018 – (one visitor was recorded in my stats on March 25) Got an email in my gmail saying new outlook subscriber started following my blog via email. New outlook subscriber visited all my blog posts, some once, some multiple times, from The Netherlands (not unusual location for me). Stats say no referrers were recorded for that day. Does not show up in my email followers list.

    March 26, 2018 – Got an email in my gmail saying a new outlook subscriber started following my blog via email. Does not show up in my email followers list. Does not have any stats regarding any visits. (no one visited my blog on March 26)

    At first I thought the first two subscribers were real and got excited and thought that they didn’t show up in my list of followers because there might have been a lag time in the system. But the third incident got me confused and that’s when I went searching for a solution and found out about the bogus outlook followers.

    My blog is https://meowzyqrush.wordpress.com. Please advise.

  • gemmacevans · Staff ·

    Hi meowzyqrush,

    Thanks for reporting this, it is the same issue that others are describing in this thread.

    Got an email in my gmail saying a new outlook subscriber started following my blog via email. Does not show up in my email followers list.

    We are monitoring for spam Outlook followers and removing them from our system. So although you receive an email notification of a new follower, they may have already been removed from our system by the time you check My Sites > People > Email Followers. Other times, you may check and those followers will still be listed but rest assured, we are working on it. As I mentioned earlier, we have be careful not to remove genuine followers using Outlook email addresses.

    Does not have any stats regarding any visits.

    If someone follows your site through the Reader, that isn’t counted as a visit in your stats — they would need to view a post or page on your site to be recorded there. I don’t have any more information about how the spam follows are being created but I wouldn’t expect to see more views in your stats when they occur :)

    I’ll pass these dates on!

  • gemmacevans · Staff ·

    Hi laurieh111 and breckb104,

    Thanks for posting in this thread — if the followers aren’t showing in your Email Followers list, it means they have already been removed.

    they will not be a threat to my blog or to anyone following my blog ?

    That’s correct, email followers don’t have access to your site, account or followers on your own site.

  • meowzyqrush · Member ·

    Thanks gemmacevans! I figured I might as well let your staff know my experience with the spam outlook followers and how realistic some of them are. It’s good to know that you guys are on it, though!

  • preparenting · Member ·

    Although I am not afraid of any “threats” from such fake accounts, it would certainly be nice to have a way to prevent them from singing up in the first place. Getting several fake email followers a day isn’t helpful or necessary. Is there not a setting to add an extra level of security before someone is able to follow you? One of those forms that makes sure it’s not a spambot?

  • gemmacevans · Staff ·

    Hi meowzyqrush,

    I figured I might as well let your staff know my experience with the spam outlook followers and how realistic some of them are.

    Absolutely, it’s always best of check these things.

  • sailstrait · Member ·

    After reading this thread I think I now understand that WordPress seems to be intercepting and removing the outlook weird addresses even though I continue to get notices even though they do not show up on my follower list. What I do not understand it why this is happening. If there is no access to the WP accounts and they are safe from spam why would anyone want to flood the sites with these fake(?) addresses. Perhaps one of the moderators or happiness engineers could add a little to my happiness by explaining not how, but why?

  • gemmacevans · Staff ·

    Hi sailstrait,

    What I do not understand it why this is happening.

    I’m afraid I don’t have a concrete reason as to why this is happening. Although to quote a previous reply by my colleague:

    The only possible benefit to these spammers is if you send an email to the address they used to subscribe, thus providing them with your email so they can spam you directly.

    So it’s best to continue ignoring them and we will take care of removing the follows from our system.

  • sarahcath · Member ·

    Thanks for this information. It has been happening to one of my blogs for a while. I figured it was a spammer, but I did not know what type of information they would be getting from following my blog. I was worried they were trying to hack the blog. I never responded to their email, just hit delete.

    Until this problem is resolved, is there a way to temporarily turn off the ability to have email followers join?

  • breckb104 · Member ·

    I will share that I spent 2 days creating a new blog, marked it as PRIVATE which is the most strict security, sent out invitations using WordPress plus detailed step by step emails urging all subscribers to get a WordPress account to join the blog, and then how to change the settings to get instant emails so they could continue to follow my blog. I sent out my first post late yesterday, and to my surprise, all of the images that I embedded in the post are deleted by Word Press and replaced with a message that you have to log into the WordPress account and see the images on the web. Not sure about your followers, but mine want to see a rich email with the images, inline with descriptive text, and not bounce over to the browser version.

    So, using a PRIVATE blog will allow you to control who follows, which is what I want to do, but you can not share your images. I added a “request” to the IDEAS forum – if you agree, please comment on my suggestion to included images in emails to subscribers of a Private blog. The subject line is: Enable Images in Emails to Subscribers of Private Blogs The instant chat support person was very helpful last night as we worked for a solution, but it appears this is a WP limitation. Please check out my request and let’s get support to be able to secure our blogs, and yet retain the ability to send images in emails.

  • staff-zinnia · Staff ·

    sarahcath – Yes, you can remove the follow blog by email widget if you have one. What is your site address? I’ll be happy to do that for you.

  • sarahcath · Member ·

    It is johncollinspe.com or johncollinspe.wordpress.com. I believed I removed the Follow by Email button, and left the Follow button.

  • staff-zinnia · Staff ·

    In order to follow your blog via the Follow Button one has to be signed in to their WordPress.com user account.

    Options are to remove the button entirely. OR you can hide it a bit further in the site through the visibility settings on that widget.

  • confessionsofaromanticsoul · Member ·

    I had the same problem. I also noted that all the spam emails followed me on days with exactly 0 visits to my blog, which means it is done on an automated basis without even visiting the blogs manually. I don’t know if this information helps, but wanted to put it out there. Thanks, everyone.

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