Department of Veterans Affairs blogger Alex Horton announced the agency will temporarily modify its comments policy on the VAntage Point blog due to an unmanageable amount of spam.
Horton said VA’s IT team is looking into a solution and, for the time being, comments will be moderated to filter out the spam.
Our comment system is more open than any government blog, and more so than most blogs in general. Unfortunately, that has produced unintended consequences. The ease of commenting has translated into an ease for spammers to leave harmful links. Though we have spam filters in place, dozens land on the blog every day. This spam has become a distraction from normal dialogue, and we spend too much time sorting through spam comments to ensure legitimate responses remain.
