Users have been reporting the following error the past few days:
Too Many Requests The user has sent too many requests in a given amount of time.
I recognize it from the past, but don't recall a resolution.
I contacted web host support, who said:
Quote
It looks like the website exceeded the number of concurrent requests to a particular location, which caused this issue. You would need to optimize your website to resolve this issue, and you can also use CDNS such as Cloudflare to reduce this issue.
He mentioned Optimize Website, which looks like the attached image in cPanel. I don't know if this is something compatible with UBBT 7.6.1.1 ? If so, what MIME types would I list?
As for Cloudflare, I have tried them way back when and it seemed to cause more problems than it solved with the forums. Is that still the case?
Thanks!
JG
GangsterBB.NET (Ver. 7.6.1.1) PHP Version 8.1.34 / MySQL 5.7.23-23 / Apache 2.4.67 2007 Content Rulez Contest - Hon Mention UBB.classic 6.7.2 - RIP
This error is from a non-standard Apache module mod-qos, this has custom modules that put restrictions on your hosting environment; unfortunately where we've been updating code in every new version to optimize the overall codebase, modules like this will over zealously restrict resources depending on its rules.
UBB.threads is a basic PHP script that assumes a standard set of web server modules are present, we can't really account for resource usage from popular sites on servers with such restrictions (most ask users to move to higher services based on how much persistent system resources they use).
I can however tell you that every single one of my sites is on Cloudflare on a free plan.
I'll monitor the situation and perhaps try CF again. But it's about website traffic being limited? My forums aren't that busy, but I did have to block the "crawl" bot last month from accessing my site as the bandwidth was many hundreds of GBs from them alone!
Does the "Optimize Website" cPanel function mentioned above seem like something that might help with these forums?
JG
GangsterBB.NET (Ver. 7.6.1.1) PHP Version 8.1.34 / MySQL 5.7.23-23 / Apache 2.4.67 2007 Content Rulez Contest - Hon Mention UBB.classic 6.7.2 - RIP
That tool appears to just tell everything on the site to process through zlib; you can enable that same functionality in the Control Panel at CP -> Master Settings -> Primary -> Advance Settings
Enable Zlib Data Compression This will result in smaller page sizes, but could add to overall server load. An explanation of zlib data compression.
CloudFlare does a pretty good job of blocking bad bots, and it's easy to blacklist entire countries if needed and is easy to detect by looking at bot traffic in their dashboard.
I know this thread is months old, but I'm having this issue again -- pretty badly now!
My forum goes down more and more often ("429 Too Many Requests") because there are THOUSANDS of "users" on the "logging in" page at the same time. BOTs, no doubt. Is there any way (via the UBB control panel or cPanel) to help stop this? Does this seem deliberate?
I tried enabling Cloudflare the other day and it locked me out of my own site! lol Even when I added my IP address to the Allow list, I couldn't even view the forum -- it said I didn't have permission! Another user reportedly said that it told him the "site doesn't exist anymore"! This is on PC/Chrome for me -- I was able to view the forums on my iPhone just fine. So I'm confused.... any ideas?
Well they aren't trying to login, they're simply hitting the login page through crawling. You could setup a robots.txt directive (for the bots that respect it) to not crawl some UBB.threads URLs such as:
I'm not sure these are search bots, though.... In the attached photo, Who's Online shows 1 registered members (1 invisible), 2,975 guests, and 17 spiders -- and most of those 3000 (and it's been up past 6000) are on the "Logging in" page...
I'll try adding those Disallow lines. I already had the following, so added the ones I didn't already have (including the login ones) and hopefully it makes a difference! Would like to figure out the Cloudflare issues to further secure the forums (I can to disconnect Cloudflare for now)....
Have there been any security improvements/settings that may help with this since version 7.6.1.1?
Giz, I see you're using bluehost for your gardening forum -- wasn't that started by someone here, or am I not remember correctly? I think I need to find another host -- do you think they can handle my forum and provide protections against this? (Hopefully I can get Cloudflare working)
My previous host for many years, A Small Orange, became web.com, and now both urls forward to the nightmare Network Solutions! I can't even log into my customer portal any more -- and no warning from them!??
GangsterBB.NET (Ver. 7.6.1.1) PHP Version 8.1.34 / MySQL 5.7.23-23 / Apache 2.4.67 2007 Content Rulez Contest - Hon Mention UBB.classic 6.7.2 - RIP
As Giz said you can block by country which I use , If I block ip I usually use UBB
On cloud flare here is a reason from the forum that may block someone inadvertently
Quote
If your PC is blocked by Cloudflare despite being on an allowlist, your browser, network, or IP might still trigger a security rule.1. IPv4 vs. IPv6 DisconnectYour allowlist might only include your IPv4 address, but your PC is browsing using an IPv6 address.Fix: Check your PC's current IP using What Is My IP Address and ensure both IPv4 and IPv6 variants are allowed in the Cloudflare dashboard.2. Browser Extensions & Ad BlockersAggressive ad blockers (e.g., uBlock Origin) or privacy-focused extensions (e.g., Privacy Badger, Brave Shields) can modify your browser headers, mimicking bot behavior.Fix: Disable all extensions and try again, or use an 'Incognito' window to bypass them.3. VPN or Local Proxy InterferenceIf you have a VPN, Proxy, or the Cloudflare WARP client running, your traffic isn't using your "allowed" IP, but rather an IP pool from the VPN service.Fix: Turn off your VPN/WARP client, or configure split-tunneling to send loc
I would double check that you are not blocking anything in cloudflare also to make sure it is working correctly before blocking by country or ip You might want to scrub the account and start over on cloudflare it could be on the setup page you have some path or ip in error that points to your site
Maybe your robots txt file blocked you or check the htaccess file
Blue Man Group There is no such thing as stupid questions. Just stupid answers
Thanks, Ruben -- I will start over with CloudFlare and see if I can get it working.
I just checked via phpMyAdmin and all my tables are already set to MyISAM. When I googled "MyISAM" (because I don't know anything about it) it suggested that it was outdated and to use InnoDB instead. Curiously, the summary row does state InnoDB while all the tables above show MyISAM.
See attachment:
GangsterBB.NET (Ver. 7.6.1.1) PHP Version 8.1.34 / MySQL 5.7.23-23 / Apache 2.4.67 2007 Content Rulez Contest - Hon Mention UBB.classic 6.7.2 - RIP
My robots.txt file is basically adding what Gizmo suggested.
I also had to edit to block "crawl bot" that was eating GBs of bandwidth months ago, and I think this blocks everything besides Bingbot and Googlebot? lol.
I enabled Cloudflare again, and once it kicked in, I again got:
It appears you don't have permission to access this page. 403 Error. Forbidden.
I didn't start from scratch, but I tried to check all the settings -- including the htaccess and robots.txt I referenced above -- and didn't see my IP being blocked (unless there's another spot I missed).
I don't have an SSL cert, but CloudFlare is accessing https... could it be that?
Anyone want to take a look for me for a reasonable fee? I can't take much more of this...
Last edited by jgeoff; 06/01/20261:24 AM.
GangsterBB.NET (Ver. 7.6.1.1) PHP Version 8.1.34 / MySQL 5.7.23-23 / Apache 2.4.67 2007 Content Rulez Contest - Hon Mention UBB.classic 6.7.2 - RIP
I think I'm getting closer... I was able to create an SSL origin cert for free on Cloudflare and installed it to the web host server... will monitor for a while and tinker with the Cloudflare settings...
Still wondering if I need to make any control panel or other changes re: http --> https I am noticing some broken images in Chrome, but Chrome is always temperamental for me
Thanks for allowing me to "think out loud" in this thread
Last edited by jgeoff; 06/01/202612:38 PM.
GangsterBB.NET (Ver. 7.6.1.1) PHP Version 8.1.34 / MySQL 5.7.23-23 / Apache 2.4.67 2007 Content Rulez Contest - Hon Mention UBB.classic 6.7.2 - RIP
Last night into today everything seemed to be working normally again -- enabling SSL w/ Cloudflare finally making my forum usable again.
Until about 30 minutes ago, I'm back to the 429 Too Many Requests b.s. that made my forums unusable most of the time before all the security changes. I keep increasing security levels -- now almost all the CF features are enabled, including forcing interactive checks for the top non-U.S. countries hitting the site (when I tried to block entire countries, it said I had to upgrade).*
*P.S. I was able to create a Custom Rule instead, to block the entire continent of Asia to see what happens. See Attachment -- that's just in 30 seconds! But site is still down... will give it a little time I guess...
I've about had it!
Last edited by jgeoff; 06/02/20265:45 PM.
GangsterBB.NET (Ver. 7.6.1.1) PHP Version 8.1.34 / MySQL 5.7.23-23 / Apache 2.4.67 2007 Content Rulez Contest - Hon Mention UBB.classic 6.7.2 - RIP
Sadly, updating robots.txt didn't solve the problem.
1 registered members (1 invisible), 1,780 guests, and 10 spiders.
When I spot-check the IPs of the "guests" "logging in" they are mostly from overseas:
We had the same problem The last time it happened, our website was down for three days. That's when we threw up our hands and implemented Cloudflare. That's the best decision we've ever made.
Look at this. Half our traffic was blocked by Cloudflare. (The half we don't want.) It's been as high as 70%. Cloudflare (for us) is free.
Server Information UBB.threads Version 8.0.0 Release 20240826 Server OS Linux Server Load 0.11 Web Server Apache/2.4.37 PHP Version 8.3.11 MYSQL Version 8.0.39 Database Size 1.82 GB
