I switched on new member moderation because my forum is getting pounded with new member spam attacks!  They register and proceed to hammer us with up to 50 or more posts about budget airfare!  It's been going on for 3 days now. 

My question is, where can my moderator staff go to approve or ban new member registrations?  Or is it only admin approval?  Sorry for a newb question but in over 10 years of IPB, I have never had to turn on new member mod! 

Manage validating members is an ACP feature. Only admins can do it.

You can use a 3rd-party resource to make it on front-end and also allow your moderators to do it:

 

Thanks again for the helpful info!  I appreciate it and I am going to try that plugin for sure!