Don- You have me baffled. How would placing the gateway on moderated status stop the post from reaching the BOARD? The post is already ON the board before the gateway message is generated. Granted, it won't hit the LIST archives--but it IS on the board unless or until the admin deletes it. Also, you can easily check the posting record of someone looking at their username for the boards but that won't tell you their email address unless they have made that information publicly accessible which most users haven't. Many people have multiple email accounts anyway and may not use the same one on their board account as they use for list subscriptions. So, how checking a board user's posting record helps you to know who is subbing to your lists I have no clue. Also--are you saying that you have your lists set to APPROVE every new subscriber? I'm not sure but I think RootsWeb frowns on this activity for the most part (most lists are supposed to be open to anyone to subscribe to them unless they have done something on the list to show cause to unsub them). Joan In a message dated 5/21/2009 5:21:35 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, ocollaugh@comcast.net writes: A few of my lists kept getting spammed, so I put them temporarily on moderate. That also stopped their spam from reaching the board. That also gave me an opportunity to check the posting records of those who wanted to subscribe before I accepted them. Things are better and I am debating with myself (GRIN) on whether to unmoderate a couple of the formerly problem lists. Improvements have been shown and I hope that trend continues. don