How do I stop spammers entering my giveaways and email lists?

Stop spam with invisible reCAPTCHA (Dashboard → Edit → 6. Invisible reCAPTCHA), remove suspicious entrants, and send only consenting entrants to your email tool.

What does KingSumo already do to stop spam?

  • Invisible reCAPTCHA checks each email entry and refuses likely bots. It's on by default for new giveaways; see How do I block spam entries with invisible reCAPTCHA?
  • Network limits: the same network can't enter a giveaway again within a minute, and a network that entered 25 or more giveaways in the past month is refused.
  • Blocked domains and networks: the KingSumo team blocks known spam email domains and networks. You can't edit these lists yourself. Refused entries are never recorded; see Why are some entrants not being registered by KingSumo?

These protections, and removing entrants, work on every plan.

How to remove spam entrants

  1. Open your giveaway's contestants page (click the number in the Contestants column of your giveaway list).
  2. Type part of a suspicious email address, such as its domain, into Search.
  3. Click the remove (trash) button next to each spam entrant.

Removed entrants can't win. Anyone who tries to enter through a removed entrant's referral link is sent back to the main giveaway page.

Keep spam out of your email tool

  • The Confirmed column (on the contestants page and in the CSV) shows who clicked the confirmation email. Bots often never confirm, but some do — also check for clusters of similar addresses.
  • SendFox, ConvertKit and Klaviyo only receive entrants who gave marketing consent. See How does the marketing consent checkbox work?

Troubleshooting

I got a sudden flood of entries

Search the contestants page for the email domain they share and remove them. Make sure Enable invisible reCAPTCHA is ticked in section 6. Invisible reCAPTCHA of the giveaway editor.

I want to block a specific email domain

Email support@kingsumo.com with the domain. Owners can't edit the block list.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I remove many entrants at once?

No. Entrants are removed one at a time.

Can I approve entries before they count?

No. Entries count as soon as they are made.

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