Last week, SixApart announced its new free open source antispam solution for TypePad. However, it is not the only way to prevent spam comments on your TypePad weblog.

Word and IP Banning

From Control Panel > Site Access, you can use the Word and IP Banning feature to stop comments before they reach your blog. You can set rules based on the originator’s IP address or URL or email address, or let the system check the content of the comment for specific keywords or phrases that are inappropriate.

Comment Moderation

Via Weblogs > Configure > Feedback you can decide to review all incoming comments before they are published on your weblog. This option is not only useful to prevent spam but also to make sure that the comments comply with the terms and conditions of your weblog (if any) and the tone is adequate.

Auto-Close

Spammers often target posts that are older. Therefore TypePad offers an auto-close feature via Weblogs > Configure > Feedback. Auto-close will automatically close the comments to your posts after a specified period of time. You can choose between several time frames, ranging from one week to one year. This eliminates the need to go back to a post and manually close the comments - the system will do it for you. Note: some people who are using Advanced Templates will not see the feature for another month or so. SixApart will roll it out shortly.

Via The Official Everything TypePad weblog.

SixApart launches TypePad AntiSpam, a free Open Source antispam service for TypePad.

The upgrade is free and automatic. The service is also included in Movable Type 4.2 Release Candidate 1 and is available as a free plugin for any user of MT 3.3 or later.

For users of other platforms, TypePad AntiSpam is a free plugin. Users of WordPress 2.3 and 2.5 can download the plugin for free, it is 100% Akismet API-compatible and both services can coexist.