I’m having the same issue. I deleted over 2k accounts last night and they keep creating them every minute in my shop. I also have no account log in options and already removed the “create account” option from my customer account page. Still doesn’t work.
Removing the “create account” option doesn’t prevent people from signing up. Web developers and people with the right technical skills know how to hit Shopify’s endpoints on the backend to create a customer.
One thing to keep an eye on his HOW the customers are getting created. If you go to the Customers page in your Shopify Admin and click into the Customer detail page for one of these spam accounts, scroll to the bottom and look at how these customers are getting created (see screenshot).
I think the best thing you can do is make sure that reCaptcha is enabled. For those using Helium Customer Fields, you can adjust the sensitivity of Google’s recaptcha to be more strict if you’re still getting spammed by these bots.
Unfortnately my reCaptcha decided to stop loading the challenge on the challenge page and only had a box which would not let me bypass it which means that customers wouldn’t be able to either so I had to disable it. Apparently this is a an issue that Shopify is aware of and nothing we can do on our end is stopping it. Even when I had reCaptcha enabled for years apparently they were creating thousands of fake accounts and only recently did I start to notice because they started using obvious www type links for their name. Only when looking through all of my customers did I notice large clusters with real names that had spammy emails that didn’t match the customer so they’ve been at it a while, even with reCaptcha enabled. They’re getting in the back end like you stated and there’s apparently not much we can do until they fix it. In another thread someone was told by Shopify that “they’re working on it”, which can mean years in Shopify time.
I did look to see potentially where these accounts were coming from and they all seem to have the same account creation. Just says Customer was created so it could be coming from my newsletter which has recaptcha or my contact forms which even though I disabled catpcha today due to it not loading properly and not allowing any form submissions, it still prompts it when running tests. Regardless I had captcha for years on my site turned on and over 4k accounts were made in that time.
I only took notice when they stopped using real names and started just posting links, over 2k of them.
Thanks for sharing. Bummer there’s not more to go on there.
I shared this in another thread, but there are 3 strategies that might help you, but unfortunately each method requires an app. Our app Customer Fields is one of the solutions. That being said, here are 3 suggested methods to try:
- Increase CAPTCHA sensitivity: Shopify’s reCaptcha settings are on/off. No sensitivity setting. Therefore an app would be required.
- Implement Email Verification: Shopify doesn’t have a setting for email verification, so that also requires an app.
- Use IP Blocking: IP blocking could work if the spam accounts are being created from the same IP. Another app.
Here are some recommended apps:
- Our app Helium Customer Fields offers both reCaptcha sensitivity settings as well as an option for email verification prior to account creation. The Lite plan includes these features and costs $12/mo.
- An app like https://apps.shopify.com/blockify looks like it could be helpful. Customer reviews seem to indicate that the app is successfully preventing spam accounts. The app has a free plan so could be a good option, although I have not used it.
This solution did not work for us. The fake accounts are still being created.
Do you know how to turn off the Shopify welcome email to new accounts so those emails are not repeatedly reported/marked as spam?
I have the same issue of fake accounts. I know I have around 2000 genuine customers,however looking today, after receiving a number of emails from unknown people saying that ‘they didnt create an account, what is going on’, and now see I have 23882 accounts in my accounts list!
The detail of the account says ‘customer was created’.
One name that occurred a lot was ‘123 123’ so started deleting these, however at 50 at a time this would take weeks! So I gave up.
One question I have is why would people/bots do this? What is their purpose, apart from annoying the store owner and flooding the addresses they signed up with ‘new account confirmation’ email from my site.
I just posted in this thread too. We’ve tried all the tricks with ZERO results.
No idea what the end game is for the account creator, however store owners run a huge risk of having their emails reported as spam to ISP’s which will cause deliverability issues and (in the case of gmail/Google) can reduce search visibility.
So frustrating.
@Terry_H_Clarke as to why, this is my only answer
@Javasusie I hear you. This sucks. Apparently, our Helium Customer Fields app is effectively solving this issue for some merchants. This review came in over the weekend.
Our support team is US-based and ready to help if you want to give the free trial a go.
We’re getting signups just like this. Very annoying. I deleted a few thousand initially and have been manually deleting them every few days but it’s a headache. Have you had any luck finding a way to block the account signups?
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I didnt work out how to stop the new accounts being created, and too many to delete every day, so tolerating them accumulating.
This is not really a problem for me as I dont do mass emails to my clients, if I were, then all these false addresses would be a problem.
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Thanks for this thread. I just started having random accounts created about 4 days ago. I upped by Captcha level. We’ll see if that worked.
If I read correctly, these fixes only work if you don’t want customer accounts. We want customers to have accounts. We just don’t want spam bots creating endless fake accounts. It is a real pain to delete 1000s of them 50 at a time using segments. Shopify needs to do something. Expand that list from 50 to 500 maybe. Or allow us to delete all customers in a segment. True there is no CAPTCHA on my custom theme. It is just annoying, not sure what harm it will do to have all these fake accounts since customer emails can also be narrowed to segments but surely don’t want to send out emails to everyone on the list knowing 5000+ are fakes with fake emails - could potentially get reported for spam to ISPs. No good. Something, ANYTHING better than clicking 50 at time and deleting them. We have done this too many times already and they just keep flooding in.
Disable Sign up is not correct solution. You can miss potential clients.
Just put validation of numbers and apply it.