waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 I have a bot visiting my site multiple times every day from the same country. How can I block this bot easily and for free? It uses a different ip address each visit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlanetCloud Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 4 minutes ago, waigyuk said: I have a bot visiting my site multiple times every day from the same country. How can I block this bot easily and for free? It uses a different ip address each visit. Hi, how are you sure it is a bot and not just a natural visitor? Also if the IP address is different, how are you able to identify it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 (edited) It's from the same country and it is a bot as I have visits all day right through the day over 24 hours Edited May 20, 2023 by waigyuk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlanetCloud Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 2 minutes ago, waigyuk said: It's from the same country and it is a bot as I have visits all day right through the day over 24 hours Okay, just be sure that your website is not indexed by Search Engines as it may be a visitor. Could also be a crawler bot to index your site. To block bots from indexing your site, see https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/robots/intro and https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/block-indexing To block certain IP from accessing your site, although might not work with MOFH, you can use CloudFlare and add an IP blacklist or other measures to block it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 (edited) I first thought this was a person as the visits started months ago and it would be a few pages on my website each day, but it has been every single day without fail for almost 6 months and in the past 2 days it has visited between every 3 to 15 minutes non stop so it can't be a person. I still want my site to be found in search engines and I can't block an ip address range as this bot uses massively different ip addresses each visit. I checked a couple of the ip addresses on ipqualityscore.com and they show up as "Fraud score 93 High risk". "Proxy/vpn detected". "Ip reported as blacklisted" Edited May 20, 2023 by waigyuk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpookyKipper Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 Try using "Bot fight mode" in Cloudflare Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 (edited) I just enabled bot fight mode in cloudflare. Does it work instantly? I've had lots of visits from the bot after setting up bot fight mode and it hasn't shown up in the firewall events list. Edited May 20, 2023 by waigyuk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlanetCloud Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 1 hour ago, waigyuk said: I just enabled bot fight mode in cloudflare. Does it work instantly? I've had lots of visits from the bot after setting up bot fight mode and it hasn't shown up in the firewall events list. How did you know that this person/bot is visiting you? Did you use analytics or something else? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 (edited) Yes afs analytics. I just noticed I have to change the name servers to cloudflare for it to work. Do I also have to host my site with cloudflare to get their bot protection? My site is hosted on byethost.com Edited May 20, 2023 by waigyuk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anyx Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 3 minutes ago, waigyuk said: Yes afs analytics. I just noticed I have to change the name servers to cloudflare for it to work. Do I also have to host my site with cloudflare to get their bot protection? Cloudflare doesn't offer hosting, they just manage your DNS records. The hosting can remain the same, usually they automatically detect your DNS configuration and set it so you don't have to do anything other than changing your nameservers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 Ok thanks I have changed the nameservers to cloudflare, waiting for the changes to take place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 Cloudflare bot fight mode hasn't worked. The name servers changed quickly but the bot visits have carried on. Cloudflare has a super bot fight mode but you have to pay for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlanetCloud Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 3 minutes ago, waigyuk said: Cloudflare bot fight mode hasn't worked. The name servers changed quickly but the bot visits have carried on. Cloudflare has a super bot fight mode but you have to pay for it. DNS changes will take up to 72 hours to propagate world-wide. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 The visits are all from one country. Can I block that country from accessing my website using cloudflare? I just set up a firewall rule to block that country, but in the cloudflare events list that country hasn't shown up even though I have had lots of visits since setting up cloudflare. I take it that will change once the updated name servers change in that country? Ok, since adding the block for that country the event list already shows four blocks from that country so blocking the country seems to be working I will find out soon if my analytics show any other visits from that country. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlanetCloud Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 2 hours ago, waigyuk said: The visits are all from one country. Can I block that country from accessing my website using cloudflare? You have to be extremely sure no legitimate customer will come from that country lol. That's a bit extreme IMO. 2 hours ago, waigyuk said: I just set up a firewall rule to block that country, but in the cloudflare events list that country hasn't shown up even though I have had lots of visits since setting up cloudflare. I take it that will change once the updated name servers change in that country? As mentioned, may take up to 72 hours. From personal experience it's mostly an hour or two at max, but the official range is 72hrs. 2 hours ago, waigyuk said: Ok, since adding the block for that country the event list already shows four blocks from that country so blocking the country seems to be working I will find out soon if my analytics show any other visits from that country. Hopefully no legitimate customers are blocked Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 (edited) My website gets hardly any visits and it's normal to get only about 5 visits a day or less. It's just a personal website and I can't remember seeing many if any visits in the past from that country so it's not a big deal. I'm sure the country block is working as I now have 11 blocked events from that country in cloudflare and no visits from that country on my website analytics. No offence to cloudflare but it would be easier for me to use my htaccess file to block the country. Is there any difference from using cloudflare or htaccess to block a country? Edited May 20, 2023 by waigyuk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TinkerMan Posted May 20, 2023 Share Posted May 20, 2023 Yes. If you use htaccess, you still get hits on your website as the orgin server is getting called. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waigyuk Posted May 20, 2023 Author Share Posted May 20, 2023 (edited) Ok I will just use the cloudflare country block now up to 17 blocks from that country. I've just disabled bot fight mode to see if that makes any difference. Two more blocks after disabling bot fight mode so it is the country block that is working. I'll leave it at that, thanks for the help. Edited May 20, 2023 by waigyuk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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