yeah, that sucked, but now there is a better newb protection up to 50K points and a honor point system, where when the guy has more points or about the same as you you get honor points for making profitable attacks and bandit points for the contrary, bandits get hunted like they had a target sign on their backs, and if you fleet-save (FS) properly and don't build a big military fleet until you have enough resources and at least 2 moons to FS you won't get attacked.

Also most, if note all, players look profit on attacks, so if you have your combat technologies level 10+, good enough defenses, team-build and don't accumulate resources on a planet you'll never be attacked, at least not by a smart player. If you need to accumulate resources you can always make a Large Cargo fleet and send it on long FS.