stop bandwidth stealing?!

[michele]

does anyone know if there are any scripts or of some way to stop people from stealing my bandwidth?

[Steven]

Hi Michele,
There should be an option in your contol panel which says hotlink protection. Click on that option and click on the enable button.

-Steven

[pete3005]

As well as what Steven said, there is a nice tutorial here:

http://www.devarticles.com/art/1/265

if you like playing in code.

Pete ;)

[Sara]

:) You can always use .htaccess to guard your images. I have been doing that lately...works like a charm.

[Aaron]

Originally posted by Steven
Hi Michele,
There should be an option in your contol panel which says hotlink protection. Click on that option and click on the enable button.

-Steven

Just for giggles I went looking for the hotlink protection link and couldn't find it anywhere in my cpanel. I'm using the vertex theme if that makes a difference.

[michele]

thanks for all the help guys! i always wondered what hotlink protection meant... :D

[Endora]

Hi All!

Well- I dont UNDERSTAND how to configure the right way for hotlink protection. My problem is how to interpret the wording in the panel.

It says "URL's TO ALLOW ACCESS". I am not sure if that means any url I put there is omitted from hotlink protection OR- if any url I put there is covered with hotlink protection .... Maybe sounds stupid but the reason it confuses me is because the way it is written.

And the same for the image file extensions. It says ALLOW also in the respective field. Again- it is my confusion as I am not clear on how to read the directions.

So, if someone knows the best way to configure for hotlink protection and can enlighten me that would be really helpful. Thank you!

Also- I am not sure of the success on a .htaccess file. Lately, from what I read the file needs to be in the server's directory and not your own personal webspace directory. I have seen much conflict on that. I did put one up anyway (thanks Mort!) but I dont know how well it works...

XO! Endora

[Aaron]

In the URLs to allow access field you'll want to list your domains.
http://yourdomain.com and http://www.yourdomain.com and also any other domains, that you want to be able to link to those types of files you list in the extensions to allow field. Those are the protected extensions, usually image files.

What happens is that when someone tries to view one of those protected file types, the server looks at where they came from (that's the referrer) and if where they came from isn't in that "allow" list, then they don't get the upload. Not sure what they get instead unless you put something in the "URL to redirect to" field, in which case they get redirected to that URL, which could be something as simple as a page you create that says, "Nice try, bozo! You're not stealing my bandwidth!"

Hope that helps.

[Questy]

On a domain using the blueflash control panel I click on the icon Hotlink Protection. On the next window mid page near the buttom is a button that says activate. I click on it and nothing seems to happen, the top of the page still says Hotlink Protection is currently disabled.

Am I missing something here???

[Aaron]

Do you have all the fields filled in?

[Chris]

I find that simply switching the image to something really gross seems to fix the problem really fast. Sure, they maybe stealing a small picture a few hundred times a day, and when you change it to an even large "offensive" image it uses more bandwidth, but it teachs the person doing the stealing not to do it again.

[harmonic]

Originally posted by Chris
I find that simply switching the image to something really gross seems to fix the problem really fast. Sure, they maybe stealing a small picture a few hundred times a day, and when you change it to an even large "offensive" image it uses more bandwidth, but it teachs the person doing the stealing not to do it again.

Yes, YES. Like when some car forum takes your picture and you change it with a picture of erm...Yeah. And then the whole car forum throws a fit. Heh. ;)

[Questy]

Do you have all the fields filled in?
Yes all fields are filled in, all URL's are valid. Now that I have some time here tonight I am going to try one of my other domains control panel to see if it looks or works any different on perhaps a different control panel style.

I find that simply switching the image to something really gross seems to fix the problem really fast.
I sent someone a friendly e-mail warning last night, today I see my graphic is no longer linked on their site. If they hadn't taken this prompt action I would have changed the graphic with something different just for the "fun of it!"

[Endora]

Aaron- Thank you for the help.

Here is another question: Is their an easy way to tell if someone is linking to an image? I am really bad about reading any logs so if someone knows an easy way that would be terrific.

Also: If you enable hotlinking... does that do anything about the images people have already linked to or does it only take effect from the point of enabling onward?

Thanks everyone!

:confused:

;)

[Questy]

My issue with the hotlink protection appears to be an issue based on which control panel skin is used, hmmm

Using the blueflash control pane the button to activate the protection appears to do nothing, on the control panel theme vertex I couldn't even find the link for the link protector, on one site using the default theme the link protector worked fine with no issues, on one site using the newpanel theme the link protector worked fine with no issues.

Is their an easy way to tell if someone is linking to an image? I am really bad about reading any logs so if someone knows an easy way that would be terrific.

Reading the server logs really is the easiest way. How I found the one yesterday I popped into control panel and clicked on Latest Visitors and looked at Referer, most of the pages were familar names, either a site I know about, or a search engine. I was getting a fair amount of traffic (listed on Latest Visitors as Referer) from a co.uk domain. When I clicked on the link, sure enough, there was my graphic!

If you enable hotlinking... does that do anything about the images people have already linked to or does it only take effect from the point of enabling onward?

Unless it is cached somewhere, everytime a graphic is "called for" from a web page a "client" asks a "server" to deliver that graphic. What you are doing is blocking the server from delivering the request. So even though someone has made the link in the past as in your question "people have already linked" the requests are blocked for anyone, anywhere, from the time you enable the hotlink protection.

Make sense? Hope this helps.

[Endora]

Thanks Questy- Yes. Made sense. BUT - the ONLY logs that make sense to me are the latest visitor logs. WHERE CAN I FIND THAT SORT OF LOG ONGOING? The others dont mean alot to me because they are statistical and not really WHO IS HITTING YOUR SITE exact.

I find several bw hogs today from looking at that and I am rather mad. Not only that- blatant cut and paste of my material. With the added slap of linking to my images to add to my articles they just COPIED without permission to their own site. YES! I AM rather miffed.

:mad:

ANYWAY- I have tried a dozen times to open the raw log files to no avail. Trying again now- but could someone tell me WHAT STATS offer the who hit what when (like latest visitors do) if that exists.

Also- HOW do you ban domains from accessing your site. I do have an access file up. I could add them to it- is that right?

Thank you a WHOLE bunch.

[Aaron]

Endora, I don't think you need to open the raw access logs. I'm using the Blue Flash theme so my instructions may be different from what you're seeing. In blueflash -> open the control panel -> under "Logs, Statistics & Error Management" click on web/ftp statistics -> when that opens you'll see a list, third item down, pretty much right in the middle is "Latest Visitors", click that -> on the next screen you'll want to look at the field that says "url" it's the middle top cell, look for image files and then look at the "referrer" field which is the bottom left cell, if that referrer is not from your domain or a domain you've given permission to link to your images, then it's likely a thief.

As for them copying your content without permission, that's a copyright violation, whether you have copyright warnings or not. Any original material you put on your website is automatically covered by copyright law. Threaten the thieves with legal action and chances are they'll stop.

[Questy]

Endora

Go to Control Panel >> Choose Webalizer

From the page webalizer/index.html You can see the links to the Month

In this case I choose Dec 2002

Accross the Usage Statistics Page is a text menu, one of the menu items is [Referrers], click on [Referrers], this will show you who is linking to your site.

Hopefully they are links from sites recommending folks to visit your site rather than sites who are linking to your images from a text page.

HTH,
Tom P.

[Chris]

I prefer Awstats. I wish there was an option to see all pages linking to documents and images on your domain. It helps keep the big ones at bay thought. Afterall, I've gotten several forums and websites with "offensive" images within the past few months.

[Steven]

Boys and Girls,
We are happy to report that we have now installed the hotlink feature into the vertex theme. We have updated this theme on all servers.

-Steven