@VioletDragon no they didn't seem to be "vpn" provider IPs - the companies that own them are not listed as specific vpn providers.. Doesn't mean they are not or could be tor exit nodes, etc.. I didn't dig that deep into it. I looked a bit more at the company that owns the one IP that had 78 reports, and it doesn't have a good rep, and comments on the rep do list vpn and tor exit nodes, etc. etc.
I just wanted to show that hey - the tools being used, which akismet is used by many different forum software, pretty sure was at first just a plugin for wordpress.. But it grew, there is a ful api so you can report ham (stuff that is not spam).. But with whatever plugin they are using for the forum software here I do not believe any of that functionality is available, etc.
My understanding is it combines info from all the sites using it to determine if something is spam and should be blocked, etc.
Yes it would be nice if you could say mark an IP, or an account for whitelisting just for your site, etc. And that may be possible with full access to the api.. But if you look nodebb I believe the only anti spam plugin I see is spam-be-gone.. So there are not a lot of options.
And if you look at the issues listed for the plugin- may of them have been open for years and years without being addressed. And there is one about this exact problem..
I believe this is the code for the plugin being used.
https://github.com/akhoury/nodebb-plugin-spam-be-gone
Maybe some smart guy here could fork it and fix it up to allow for whitelisting accounts by username/emailaddress.
But normally if you go over 5 rep points askmet stops blocking your stuff. There are few threads where you can just ask for rep points and people normally chime in and get you over 5 really quick..