I really like Barbie's idea, I hadn't thought of that. It doesn't seem anything like that exists currently, but if someone tracks it down, let me know. That would indeed be a great option.

I don't see requiring a photo working on a forum like this where anonymity is a concern. Especially for people that have never been here before and have no trust developed. We're also not going to manually approve every member. It's a ton of work to avoid one or two troublemakers, and there would be no way of knowing if they were or were not one of who we're watching for anyway.

I appreciate the link to the forum mod. Unfortunately that is compatible with a very old version of the software and only checks the banned IP which is the root problem, we don't know the true IP because of the proxy. We already ban by IP, but thanks!

To the upgrade itself...the greater point is that although we have a pain in the ass user, we don't stop doing everything else we need to focus on that exclusively. We do what we need to AND we try to improve on that issue. Sort of like just because you may need to go on a diet, you don't need to quit your job to focus on that entirely because that would cause it's own set of new problems.

I appreciate the suggestions!