Blocking Rules
This page explains how to use blocking rules. Blocking rules allow you to define specific user behavior to block users within your account or instance. Blocking rules support blocking users based on either content or sending frequency of user messages.
Creating Your First Blocking Rule
Account-level blocking rules are accessible from the Settings page under the "User Blocking" tab. An account-level blocking rule can block users only within that account.
Instance-level rules can be accessed by first going to the Settings page, clicking on the "Advanced" tab, clicking on the "Superadmin Actions" tab, then scrolling down to the "User Blocking Rules" section. An instance-level blocking rule can block any user on that instance.
To create a blocking rule, first click the "Add Rule" button above the user blocking rules table on one of the pages described above.
For content-based blocking, set a regular expression. Each user's messages will be compared to the regular expression and the user will be blocked if a message matches. Regular expressions can have a maximum of 100 characters. Note that numbers that correspond to quick replies (e.g. 1, 2 or 3 for a list of three quick replies) will not match.
To block users based on message frequency, set the number of messages a user must send to be blocked (messages per interval) and the amount of time in minutes in which those messages must be sent (interval). A user will be blocked if the number of messages they send in the specified interval reaches the specified number of messages per interval.
A blocking rule must have either a regular expression or a message frequency (the number of messages and the interval in minutes) but may not have both.
Optionally, you may specify how long the user is blocked by setting blocking duration. This specifies the amount of time in minutes that the user will be blocked. If blocking duration is not specified, users blocked by this rule will be blocked permanently.
Numeric fields (messages per interval, interval, and blocking duration) can have a maximum of five digits.
Once you have configured your blocking rule, click the "Save" button.
Managing Your Blocking Rules
Blocking rules can be deleted by clicking the arrow on the combo button then clicking "Delete." This will remove the blocking rule but any users who were blocked by that rule will remain blocked. You can also click "Edit" on the combo button to modify an existing blocking rule. This will also not affect existing blocked users.
Managing Blocked Users
To view a list of all users in an account who are currently blocked, go to the "User Blocking" tab on the Settings page. Clicking on a user's ID will take you to their chat log on the Chats page. Note that this will display users blocked by both account-level and instance-level rules as well as users blocked by rules that were later deleted, so the blocking rule ID shown may not correspond to a blocking rule that is visible to you.
Blocked users who were blocked by a rule that has a blocking duration set will automatically be unblocked based on that duration. To unblock them sooner or to unblock permanently blocked users, go to their chat log on the Chats page, click on the arrow at the bottom of the right panel, and click "Unblock User."