If you are using E-Classifieds software you have version 2.39 or older which has the link to send email to a friend you will be a target for spammers.

The form lacks a image verify input to weed out bots from using this form.

A bot only need send the following and wham you may find your site black listed.

session_key=&send_ad_button=on&results_format=long&db_id=any ID&query=retrieval

For the ID above of course it will have an ID for one of your classified ads.

Until a new version comes out remove this ability for users to send any ads to anyone.

This can be done with a standard text editor but keep a backup of each file in case you make a mistake where you can always restore the original file.

First in the classifieds.cgi main file on line 724 comment out the following by placing a # in front of each line as shown below:

#elsif ($form_data{'send_ad_button'} ne "")
#  {
#  $helptopic = "send";
#  &pagesetup("Send Ad To A Friend");
#  &generic_form_header;
#&require_supporting_libraries (__FILE__, __LINE__, "$path/library/search_and_display_db.pl");
#  &search_and_display_db;
#  exit;
#  }

Next in the HTML folder find the file search_results_body.pl

On line 345 remove the line:
<a href="$script_url?session_key=$session_key&send_ad_button=on&results_format=long&db_id=$fields[$index_of_db_id]&query=retrieval"><img src="$graphics_dir/email.gif" width="120" height="27" border=0 alt="E-mail this ad to a friend!"></a>

 

Also remove the file send_ad.pl from the folder /library or rename it as send_ad.bak

These changes will disable the send to friend ability.
When E-Classifieds makes the required changes to prevent Spammer abuse you can upgrade to newer version.

Vincent G.