Article: Annoying Chat Bots... are they smart enough??

[Romit]

Ok guys, i finally tried to write an article:
(this is my first time... so feedback is appreciated! )
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Annoying Chat Bots... are they smart enough??

By: Romit Gadhiya
(Romit.Gadhiya@gmail.com)

Yahoo chat... on of the biggest chat networks has also been one of the biggest "BOTs" victim. Everybody who has used Yahoo chat has come across these Bots knowingly or unknowingly. So I finally decided to discuss these Bots in detail.

Lets start with the introduction, have you ever noticed something like this in Yahoo's general chat window... "anyone bored n wanna chat?" or "i just finished some stuff up who wants to chat". Well, if you thought it was some human writing those messages then you were wrong! and if you knew that it was not any human but some automated system writing it... then congratulations. For those who don't know, it is something that is called a Bot... something which tries to act like human and talks to us like an human with some intentions. To define it properly, a 'Chat Bot' is an automated system which is disguised to be a human and is generally given a task, which in most of the cases is to advertised some product or extensively, a website.

It goes without saying that a bigger group of people know about these Bots and generally do not respond to them. But at the same time, there is a group of community too which has no idea about these Bots and they generally are the biggest victims of it. This article tries to unlock some of the facts about the Bots and specially techniques used by such Bots to fool Yahoo.

To start with, lets have a look at some general characteristics of a Bot:

* The Name: Most of the Bots, fortunately, have strange name. For example: "!!!!!!Female", "!!!!!*Cheaters*!", "~CoolegeCutie~", "aa1knopka1000261_27", etc. Though there are many real looking names as well.
* The Description: Majority of these Bots are found to have very pleasing and attractive description. The description might be something like this: aa1Guru_fetisch_18 | Female | Age:18 | Location: Tampa, Florida, United States | Idle:20 minutes.

* The disguise: These Bots, as they are supposed to be, are disguised very well as humans. If you talk to them they would answer like a human. For example, if you say "Hi" you would get answer like "Hello! how do you do?". They are found to be writing something catchy in the general chat window... like:
o "anyone bored n wanna chat?"
o "i just finished some stuff up who wants to chat"
* The Features: There are many variety of Bots (funny but true!). All of them with one intention... "To get you to their site". Most of these Bots are found making statements like: "Get free this, get free that... all free click here-->>*LINK*bla bla bla". Efficiency of such Bot is very less because most of the people are aware of scams going around on the net and as a result they don't generally click on such links. But if they do, its win win situation for the Bot makers. Other kind of Bots sends you a PM saying something like: "Click on the blue link to see me naked.. bla bla bla bla" etc. They too have less efficiency. Some of such Bots are so annoying that if you reply them, they resent the same message... then again you say something and they send you the same message again! Other kind of the Bot is the most realistic looking Bot, it send you a PM saying: "Hi" and literally talks to you for some time just like an human. Then after some talks, it gives you a link to go to. Such Bots are most successful.

Once you know characteristics of a Bot you can very easily spot one, and then you can literally play with it to see how foolish it is! I did an very interesting experiment. Have a look at the screen shot to see what happens when a Bot is confused. It goes MAD and very well proves that it is an BOT! In the screen shot I have added, you can see I am talking as "r.test test" while the Bot is "Latina52060_43". It is very clear that I am making sentences which will make any person angry... but since its an Bot on other side, you see the case is different.

So, next time, if you are a little suspicious, ask "What is color of a tennis ball?" and see whets the answer!

But, at the end of the day, no matter how foolish these Bots are, they are annoying. Yahoo does not seems to understand this problem very well and still has not been able to eradicate these Bots. Yahoo is found to be using two main visible weapons. First one being the "Report" tool where in a member reports a Bot and Yahoo takes actions, and second, the more interesting one, is yahoo's own Bot. It is generally seen that Yahoo starts deleting those messages in general chat window which are repeated more then a specific time. For example I keep on sending message like "hi xyz hi xyz" again and again.. then after some time I would see Yahoo automatically deleting my messages. This way Yahoo can stop annoying repeated messages in general chat window. But still Bots are seen to easily override yahoo's message limit, lets see how...

Initially I was going to write an article on how Foolish these Bots are, but during my research I was taken aback by the tricks these Bots used to fool yahoo's security code. I found one such technique which surprised me to be anything! Lets have a look at that technique. I call it the "Hidden Text Technique". Lets start with a question: "What happens when you write with white colored fonts on white background?". The answer is simple, you cannot see the text though it is there. Now have a look at the screen shot:

Here you can see a Bot named "*Rachel*" writes: "i just finished some stuff up who wants to chat". But, when you select the whole text you see that it is actually written as: "i justpfinished some stuffuup who wantsato chatmkp". SURPRISING! isn't it?? Go to a chat room and try selecting any Bot's text and you would notice that there are some more letters in the text but they are hidden because they are white colored. Now, why is it like that? answer is simple, every time the text which is hidden would be changed, so Yahoo Bot would be fooled and would not hide these messages even if they are repeated thousands of time because every message is actually different from the other one though looks the same!

This technique really proves that these Bots are smart enough! But, there is more! I saw a Bot which has YOUR username in its message! Have a look at this another screen shot:

Here you can see that as soon as a user enters a room, this Bot writes a message which has that person's user name in it! Such Bots wait for somebody to enter the room, and once it spots a new user, it immediately writes a message! This is very good indeed, because nobody expects a Bot to take user's name, but when they do, it gives them a human effect. and all such smart Bots are very much successful.

So now we know what is a Bot, what are features of an Bot, and how foolish or smart are these Bots. We also saw yahoo's efforts to stop these Bots. Now comes an very interesting question: "I have no knowledge of coding whatsoever, can I make MY OWN Bot??". If you thought 'NO', then you should be feeling lucky to read this article because answer is 'YES!!'. Do not be surprised, but there are full fledge softwares which helps you make your own Bot very easily and quickly and without any coding knowledge! and know what? its free. The software comes with an handy tutorial as well! The software I am talking about is named "Yahoo! Responder Bot" And here's how the makers of the software describe it...

"The Yahoo Responder Bot 2.1 is the latest version of the best Yahoo Bot available. In addition to adding a number of new features, this Bot has been designed to be useful to advertisers, with features like Bot profiles, room joining and goto user features.

With the Yahoo Responder Bot, advertisers will no longer have to put up with annoying, spam style Bots that post a url to to the room, or run through canned scripts, but can instead provide a more interactive Bot. One that can hold PM conversations, answer common questions, or add a touch of humor and personality. In a world were Yahoo Bot advertisement is oversaturated, you can make your advertisement standout in the crowd..."

Surprised?? if not, I bet you would be when you read this:

"The link below can be used to download this new Bot, and if you want to use it for personal use, it has everything you need. However, if you're an advertiser, and need the ability to move your Bot between rooms, then you will need to purchase a Bot license. For a limited time, a five simultaneous Bot license costs just $29.95, twenty-five Bots costs $144.95. But remember, you can download the Bot for free, see how it works in a single room, and once you are satisfied, then purchase a license. The Yahoo responder Bot is the best Yahoo chat Bot and the best Yahoo ad Bot there is. Download it now, free, and see for yourself."

So now you know, the Bot network is not as small as it seems! There are professional Bot makers with their professional softwares which are sold for real money. I have deliberately not added the website link here because this article, not in any way, is written to encourage Bots. If you still want it, you may Google it. Here are some of the features included in the Bot software which shows the level of professionalism in making Bot softwares.

* Bot Profiles A Bot profile is the collection of all the information related to your Bot, such as login, fonts, spam settings, response files, etc., being kept in a single file.
* Multipe Response Files A Bot profile can contain multiple response files, this lets you better modularize the personality of your Bot.
* Multiple Tabbed Editor Windows You can edit more than one response file at a time, with each file being kept in a separate tab.
* State Based Responses Responses available to a chatter are dependent on the state of the chatter. This can be used to limit certain Bot responses to a fixed set of people, or to dynamically change how the Bot responds to people based on their post history.
* Commands The Bot now supports the use of commands as a type of response. For instance the command /state can be used to change the state of a chatter based on something he has posted.
* Room joins the /join command is available to those who have purchased a license for the product. This command allows the Bot to switch rooms.
* Timer Events The Bot can now respond to timer events. A timer event combined with the /join command can be used to automatically switch to a new room on a regular basis.
* Variables in Search Expressions Defined variable arrays can now be used in the search expression of a reponse line. Also, %name can be used as well.
* PM Tabs PM conversations are now tracked in a separate window, each with its own tab.

So, for conclusion of this article we all have our eyes opened about a very small thing called "Bot" which actually has bigger network then we ever though! I personally believe that Yahoo's efforts to fight these Bots are still in primary stages but meanwhile the Bots have moved a step ahead from their primary stage to become a big network. For now, all we can do is to ignore such Bots and report them! and lets hope Yahoo wakes up soon!