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Can I block referring links from specific sites?


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Can I block referring links from specific sites?
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2009-09-07, 17:25

I have a private subdomain that enables my family to see where I am on the map in real time or previous tracks. Anyway, I noticed recently that a website I don't know is referring people to my site. A little more than I would prefer. So can I block a domain from sending referrals?

We (the developers of the tracking software and web based interface) are working on getting password protection up, but this is the first time someone I don't know has been going there.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
  quote
Iago
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2009
Location: Hmm?
 
2009-09-07, 17:27

Unfortunately if it's on the internet and public, you can't stop people linking to it.

If the referring site is a robot and it plays by the rules, you might be able to stop it using robots.txt. Beyond that I would put up a holding page where the old page was with some kind of very, very small link to the actual page that's obfuscated as much as possible.

I'm Joseph Fritzl, and no windows was my idea.
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jdcfsu
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Florida
 
2009-09-07, 18:09

Why not create your own password system using .htaccess? Just give the password to people you want to have it.
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Bryson
Rocket Surgeon
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: The Canadark
 
2009-09-07, 18:15

*attempts to find out the subdomain so he can track turtle*
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Banana
is the next Chiquita
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
 
2009-09-07, 18:22

Personally, I'm inclined to think that whoever is running the website is in desperate need of referrals. If you can obtain the email of the whoever's running the website, I am sure they'll appreciate you doing them the favor of signing up for free iPhones, iPods, few medical supplements and steamy materials. Oh, few viruses as well, you know to help them beefen up the immunity system.


(Sorry that I don't have any actual advice. )
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2009-09-07, 18:42

Well, Google Analytics says this: thebesthosting.org | /showthread.php

So now I'm wondering how my address got posted like that?

I don't want to do the .htaccess because it's more of pain to block at all... oh well. I guess I'll have to now.

What about black listing that domain, would it matter? Everyone would come from their own IP right?

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
  quote
Iago
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2009
Location: Hmm?
 
2009-09-07, 18:54

Quote:
Originally Posted by turtle2472 View Post
Well, Google Analytics says this: thebesthosting.org | /showthread.php

So now I'm wondering how my address got posted like that?

I don't want to do the .htaccess because it's more of pain to block at all... oh well. I guess I'll have to now.

What about black listing that domain, would it matter? Everyone would come from their own IP right?
Would it be inconvenient to move it and then set robots.txt to block ALL robots? That way it'd be very difficult for someone to find it. Something like http://www.yourdomain.com/subfolder/...876876327.html which isn't inconvenient if you're got it bookmarked. Might be easier than faffing in .htaccess.

I'm Joseph Fritzl, and no windows was my idea.
  quote
turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2009-09-07, 20:53

Quote:
Originally Posted by Iago View Post
Would it be inconvenient to move it and then set robots.txt to block ALL robots? That way it'd be very difficult for someone to find it. Something like http://www.yourdomain.com/subfolder/...876876327.html which isn't inconvenient if you're got it bookmarked. Might be easier than faffing in .htaccess.
well, I just added a "." to the front of the folder and already have my robots.txt set to prevent good bots from looking. I also had a "sandtrap" in place that would allow bad bots to follow a hidden link that captures their IP and then adds it to a banip.txt file that is then referred to and all blocked IPs are blocked from viewing any pages. Problem is it didn't seem to work right after getting onto my new server. My list is empty and I know it shouldn't be. Now I need to troubleshoot that little issue too.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
  quote
ast3r3x
25 chars of wasted space.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Send a message via AIM to ast3r3x  
2009-09-08, 13:59

If you have access to the server (apache.conf or .htaccess), you can use apache's mod_rewrite to check the referrer and block a domain.

Edit: I should say though that this is only a moderately effective fix, but it is what you asked for I think.
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2009-09-08, 15:52

Thanks for the input on that. I'll look into that one again. For now I think I'm going to focus on getting my sandtrap fixed first though.
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dmrnj
 
 
2009-09-09, 13:47

No human is actually accessing your family site, don't worry. You're just the victim of log spam:

http://www.google.com/support/forum/...4b3688a8&hl=en

It's unfortunately an annoying hijack. Someone is probably running through all possible numbers of Google Analytics IDs and loading up the tracker for each one with a referral of their domain in hope that you will be curious as to what it is and visit. I got this on my personal site, but I logged into a separate account for work and got similar hits a few days before. I wouldn't bother locking this page down, since it's likely nobody actually visited it, just randomly loaded up your tracker on their page to spam you.
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turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2009-09-09, 13:54

Wow, Welcome to AppleNova!

Thanks for the link. I would have never thought something like that would go on. Interesting really. So something like my sandtrap would likely minimize this in the future then too.

Oh, here, have a cookie too! Kinda refreshing to have a new member who isn't just spamming us.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
  quote
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