Hmmm… just tested my theory about the link by posting as guest with link as last item in post. The redirect issue did not happen.

we actually have seen this happen once or twice too…  was when guests could post here… and never could recreate it again…  and no discernible pattern…   in fact, at the time, we were hypothesizing that it could be an akismet related bug, but could not verify or check…  when it went a way after a day or two, seemed plausible…

so please let us know if you can get any more data or if it persists…

Interesting, at least it’s not just me!

Will report back with whatever I can come up with. Temporarily deactivated Akismet on our test site to investigate further.

well, as I said, it happened to us a couple times and was completely random that we could see… and never came back… so if it persists for a week and you can repeat it, especially with akismet disabled, please let us know…

Will do!

A note to anyone else who may be experiencing this issue, and wants to help troubleshoot…

Below is a message I sent to our Moderators indicating how they can help me try to identify some sort of pattern:

Hello Moderators,

You may or may not have noticed that sometimes deleting a spam post by a guest will redirect you to a link within the post after clicking OK.

I am trying to help the SimplePress developers identify any sort of pattern causing this issue. It does not happen on all posts, but there is a way to identify if it is going to happen.

Please continue to delete obvious spam posts, except for any that will open a link when you do so. Leave those for me to investigate. Here’s how to determine if they will open a link upon deletion, and what to do if so:

1. View spam post using Admin Bar
2. Hover cursor over “Delete this Post”. (Do not click button.)
3. Check to see if status bar at bottom of browser window indicates a link.
4. If no link is shown when hovering over button, click Delete then OK. (Post should disappear without any link opening.)
5. If link appears when hovering over button, do not delete post.

There is no need to notify me of any nefarious posts. Just leave them for me to moderate so I can try to troubleshoot further. If you notice any sort of pattern to this behavior, please feel free to let me know.

Thanks for the help!

Please feel free to use or edit this message to ask the same of your moderators. For any posts that look like they will launch a link upon deletion, I will be reviewing them carefully to see if I can’t find some sort of similarity in their HTML, IP addresses, or some other pattern.

Stay tuned…

okay, thanks…

Observations so far (on live site with Akismet activated)…

Redirection only occurs if hovering over “Delete this post” button indicates hyperlink in browser status bar.

Review of HTML in nefarious posts indicates nothing peculiar.

Deletion of posts from the Forum Toolset in topic view does not redirect to the link, redirection only occurs from Admin Bar delete button. (Hoping this tidbit may help!)

Three spam posts so far on test site with Akismet deactivated, yet none had redirect issue, though none were from same spammer as live site.

the couple times it happened to us, it was only in admin bar with akismet active…  so curious to see how your testing progresses with akismet deactivated…  it just stopped happening to us… but of course, now we dont use akismet because we dont get any spam with the memberships…

OK, I encountered another nefarious post and wanted to include this snippet of source code from the Admin Bar view to show that the spam link is being embedded in the form code. Note “michaelkorsoutlet4you.com” link near the end.:

<input class="spSubmit" name="a2-92737" value="Delete
this Post" onclick="javascript: if(confirm('Are you sure you want to delete this Post?')) {spabModeratePost('', 'http://tripawds.com/index.php?sp_ahah=moderation&sfnonce=7bbaaaa6da&pid=92737&tid=3959&fid=6&action=2&canremove=1', '1', '92737', '6', '3959', '1', '2', 'http://tripawds.com/index.php?sp_ahah=autoupdate&sfnonce=7bbaaaa6da');}" type="button"><div id="sfqform3959" class="spInlineSection"><form action="http://tripawds.com/forums/" method="post" name="addpost3959" onsubmit="return spabSaveQuickReply(this, 'http://tripawds.com/index.php?sp_ahah=quickreply&sfnonce=7bbaaaa6da&tid=3959&fid=6', 'http://tripawds.com/index.php?sp_ahah=moderation&sfnonce=7bbaaaa6da&pid=92737&tid=3959&fid=6&action=0&canremove=1', '92737', '6', '3959', '1', '0', 'http://tripawds.com/index.php?sp_ahah=autoupdate&sfnonce=7bbaaaa6da')"><textarea tabindex="1" class="spControl" name="postitem3959" id="postitem3959" cols="60" rows="8"></textarea><br><input tabindex="2" class="spSubmit" id="sfsave3959" name="newpost3959" value="Save New Post" type="submit"></form><br></div></a></div></div></div></div><a href="http://michaelkorsoutlet4you.com/" target="_blank">
</a></div><div class="spClear"></div>

In this particular case, the post was loaded with links and the last item in the post was a link, but reviewing the HTML confirmed the ling tag was closed with </a>.

[scratches head]

Also, clicking either Cancel or OK on the confirm deletion pop-up will redirect to the link.

Thanks for this Jim.

We will need to take a close look at this source code but at a quick first glance that link at the bottom is way, way outside of the delete button control which ends down there around line 6.

Curious. I know it can happen because it has happened to me although a long, long time ago.

Still – thanks, We will take a closer look at this source.

You’re not using your Post Thanks plugin here!

lol… nope!

jim, that last snippet you posted, was that with or without akismet?  if with, has it ever happened without akismet?

Mr Papa said
was that with or without akismet?

That was from our live site where Akismet is indeed still activated, via WPMS network activation. I’m still monitoring our test site where I have deactivated Akismet and will report back as soon as (if) it happens there.