Hotlinked images... How can you tell?

[sleepyroot]

Hello :-)

I'm not sure if this is the right forum in the community to ask this question but here it goes.

I would like to know how do you tell if someone is hotlinking your images onto their websites? I mean if I have a picture on my site and they get the address to that picture and then display it on their site without actually saving it to their webspace...... how do you tell when that's happening?

Thanks,
David
www.sleepyroot.com

[joshuamc]

David, you can check this by analyzing your access logs. Do you have any webstats installed?

[stevel]

As Josh suggests, you look in your access log for a reference to your image where the referrer is another site's URL. Webstats are useful as they can give you a list of referrers to search your logs for.

[sleepyroot]

Hey guys, yes I do have webstats enabled.... Still trying to learn how to make since of some of the things there lol. So are the access logs located in the webstats or do I find that somewhere else.... through my ftp maybe?

[stevel]

In OPS, HTTP, Log Files.

[don1976]

On the same subject, the hotlink protection script available through OPS doesn't seem to work. When I activate it, it blocks all images on my own site aswell!!!

I have set it to allow all my URL's access but no joy.

[stevel]

Just as well. Creates more trouble than it's worth.

[joshuamc]

On the same subject, the hotlink protection script available through OPS doesn't seem to work. When I activate it, it blocks all images on my own site aswell!!!

I have set it to allow all my URL's access but no joy.
Care to share your domain so that I can look at the account?

[don1976]

Main/Master Domain -
hmssneck.com

Serviced Domains -
caleythistleonline.co.uk
caleythistleonline.com
invernesscaledonianthistlefc.com
highlandmarch.co.uk

[omegaman66]

Preventing Hotlinking can be done via htaccess also. It works on my site in the few places I use it.

[Wrangler#3]

It is more fun to replace the hotlinked image with an image thats not so nice. ;)

[stevel]

Except that any image on your site must conform to the Terms of Service here...

[don1976]

From what I can tell the tool within OPS is suppose to create the .htaccess for you.

I had an issue recently which is what made me try the tool as I didn't have much time to deal with it. How wrong I was thinking the tool would save me time as I ended up spending more time having to undo what I did just to get my images back.

Replacing the image isn't really an option when the theft is of an image used on more than one of our own sites and in more than one location which means I would have to go through and make the changes in all the relevant places.

It just seems that everytime I touch any of the tools in the new OPS it screws something up and ends up creating more work than it is designed to prevent.

Never mind, am sure Endurance have a nice wee tool up their sleeve that they can offer at a fee to fix it, seems to be the way of things now!!!!

[sleepyroot]

How do you prevent hotlinking with htaccess? If the script that powweb provides doesn't work as was mentioned.... and I'm weary of even trying it because I don't want to have spend a week trying to fix it, then maybe the htaccess fix may be the way to go for me.

I would just like to be able to fix my site so that noone can hotlink anything and I won't have to worry about constantly checking to see if someone stealing bandwidth.

[stevel]

The method used is to match the referrer against valid hostnames for your site, and if they don't match, fail the request. The problem is that many browsers or security software installed on users systems sends either no referrer or a false one, with the result that people legitimately viewing your site can't see the images. Another issue is that people often forget to take the different hostname for https access into account.

My personal view is that unless you become aware of enough bandwidth theft to be meaningful, hotlink protection usually causes more trouble than it is worth. It can also be easily gotten around.