WARNING: I have a couple friends who have been trying to sign up for this forum for awhile. Maybe the admin should look through the names more carefully. Just a suggestions.
I just deleted over 2000 spam account requests. There could possibly have been some legit accounts in there too, but I'm not going to try to weed through 2000 account requests in order to find a few legit ones! Sorry. That's why I created the two step account request procedure described in the first post to this thread.
Most likely two of my friends had account requests in that batch. I told them to email you, but I don't think they understood. Obviously there's no way you can sift through 2000 accounts and identify the good ones unless you know what usernames to look for. I'll get back to them and hopefully they'll get back to you.
I had the same problem years ago on my own forum. I think someone has written a script to sign up fake users and is using it on this forum. I doubt people are that bent on signing up with fake names.
Maybe there is a fix for it. I wonder if it's possible to add one of those boxes that pop up where you have to copy the word in a picture to prove you aren't a bot when you sign up.
Check this out! Here is a thread on a mod you can install that asks a question you have to answer properly before it will let you register. The guy also has an interesting story of what he's gone through and finally said he switched to vBulletin, a paid software.
No new users for awhile. Maybe it's too hard to sign up. A couple people I know have expressed interest. I don't know if they've tried signing up, but the extra steps are a hassle.
surfsteve: The first post in this thread lists info at tronanews.us for that very purpose. I haven't heard any complaints from the admin regarding phony emails on that account.