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Dealing With Those Pesky Hotlinkers

Posted By Eli On February 19, 2007 @ 10:22 pm In Neat Tricks and Hacks | 85 Comments

Sorry I haven’t been posting lately guys. I got lots of pretty damn good excuses for it but I’ll spare you of having to hear them. This week I’m back on the ball and I’m going to attempt to up my post volume to make up for the slack the last week and a half.

Today’s post is a detailed way to deal with pesky hotlinkers. Hotlinkers are people who use your binary content and instead of hosting it themselves they just link directly to it on their site. I saw a funny article awhile back about a guy who threatened to sue another webmaster for removing the images he was hotlinking to on his server. That’s pretty funny stuff for anyone with half a brain, but there must of been a better way for the victim to get his rewards from the hotlinker instead of having to rename or remove the images. So true to tradition here at Blue Hat we’re going to look at some simple ways to not only stop them from hotlinking to your material but to try to get some of their visitors out of it as well. Personally I see hotlinking as a compliment. It means you have quality content. However there in lies the opportunity. If they are hotlinking to your content then their visitors must be of the similiar niche as yours. So I see no moral dilemma in trying to grab some of their visitors while politely letting them know that you don’t appreciate them sucking up your bandwidth. Let’s look at a few media formats and determine some ways to draw their visitors to your site using your .htaccess file. If you don’t know what a .htaccess file is please [1] go here and do some reading.

Images
Images are the most commonly hotlinked to content so lets tackle them first. The trick here is to simply replace the image they are hotlinking to with an image that advertises your website. So make an image saying something like, “Go To www.MyDomain.com To View This Image.” Then name the file hotlinked.jpg and upload it to your server.
Then add this to your .htaccess file
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://mydomain.com/.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com/.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule .*\.(jpg|jpeg|gif|png|bmp)$ hotlinked.jpg [R,NC]

Flash Files
You have two options with flash. You could use the same method as the images and show a different flash file that displays an ad for your site. A more aggressive option might be to use the getURL() method inside the flash file and have it actually forward the user to your site. So your essentially hijacking any hotlinkers site or dare I say Myspace page. Create this file and name it hotlinked.swf then put this in your .htaccess file.
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://mydomain.com/.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com/.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule [^hotlinked].(swf)$ http://www.mydomain.com/hotlinked.swf [R,NC]

Music
Sometimes sites users from MyPlaylist.org, Musiclist.us, and other sites will jack your mp3 files for their myspace pages and other sites. So its not a bad idea to have some fun and create a short audio advertisement for your site and put it into an mp3 file called hotlinked.mp3 then put this in your .htaccess file.
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://mydomain.com/.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com/.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.mydomain.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule [^hotlinked].(mp3)$ http://www.mydomain.com/hotlinked.mp3 [R,NC]


85 Comments To "Dealing With Those Pesky Hotlinkers"

#1 Comment By emp On February 20, 2007 @ 2:32 am

Great stuff, as always.
Looking forward to your updates.

::emp::

#2 Comment By RougeDemon On February 20, 2007 @ 6:30 am

Personally, I like to replace my hotlinked images with a goatse pic ;) Especially when the site doing the hotlinking is a couples honeymoon site.

#3 Comment By Rob On February 20, 2007 @ 8:43 am

Heheh - perfect!

#4 Comment By Al Davies On February 20, 2007 @ 9:11 am

Is there an easy way to determine whether you’re being hotlinked? Or do you just do an image search on the major search engines?

#5 Comment By Eli On February 20, 2007 @ 10:57 am

On your Awstats when you look at the referal stats, torwards the bottom. If it shows up as

theirdomain.com/theirpage.html 0 100

that means their site sent 100 hits to you but 0 pageviews. In other words they are hotlinking.

#6 Comment By Al Davies On February 20, 2007 @ 11:05 am

Thank you mucho!

#7 Comment By Seostomp On February 20, 2007 @ 11:12 am

Great post Eli. Wouldn’t have ever thought of that myself but I do have a great use for it now ;) .

#8 Comment By Aur On February 20, 2007 @ 11:32 am

One question I have, if someone is hotlinking an image on your website, does google takes it for its ranking algorithm as if it was a link to an html page?
Because if it is so, I wouldn’t mind being hotlinked (as long as pictures are not drawing too much bandwidth of course!).

#9 Comment By Eli On February 20, 2007 @ 11:39 am

Hmmm. perhaps I should of titled the post “How To Steal Traffic From Hotlinkers?” Hehe all well.

#10 Comment By Eli On February 20, 2007 @ 11:41 am

Nope, unfortunately they don’t. At this point hotlinkers are strictly a bad thing.

#11 Comment By flakki On February 20, 2007 @ 1:53 pm

I like the getURL() plan for Flash. Aside from hotlinking, you should be able to protect your swf’s from people outright stealing them as well. I can’t remember if there’s a way to check the host through ActionScript, but you could always put a loadVariables() call in a script that pulled a variable from a text file on the server. Then if the swf didn’t find the text file, getURL() and redirect to your own site.

Of course they’d figure it out as soon as they tried to test it, but with a little creative thought a person would probably be able to trick them into thinking it was working for a while and then start redirecting.

Or, as soon as your swf discovered it wasn’t on its home server, it seems to me there should be a world of fun capable from within a Flash file with an IP that wasn’t connected to you in any way.

#12 Comment By Sammy Davis Jr. Jr. On February 20, 2007 @ 4:34 pm

Good post. Glad you are back to posting !

#13 Comment By Mark Laymon On February 20, 2007 @ 8:19 pm

I had trouble with someone hotlinking my debt pics on craigslist. I just changed the pics to my favorite porn star in all her glory. They were booted with in the day.

#14 Comment By Alex Kirs On February 20, 2007 @ 9:47 pm

I wish everything be as easy as you describe :)
But there are tones of conditions, when referer is not passed in HTTP request. And this your visitors will see hotlink moks instead of content.

To solve this issue, you need do magic with content URL manualy :)

#15 Comment By Eli On February 20, 2007 @ 10:18 pm

So true :)

All the examples above do take into account for no referals passed. i.e. direct requests:
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$
That means IF NOT BLANK REFERRER.
However sometimes referals from google or google images directly to the images will cause these conditions to pass. If you rely on this type of traffic than you could reverse all the conditions and say IF REFERRER IS FROM and then list all the sites that hotlink to you that you DON’T want to allow.
Here’s an example
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !http://profile.myspace.com/.*$ [NC]
RewriteRule .*\.(jpg|jpeg|gif|png|bmp)$ hotlinked.jpg [R,NC]

Notice the missing ^

#16 Comment By Alex Kirs On February 20, 2007 @ 10:23 pm

Ah ya, you are right :)

#17 Comment By andrew wee On February 21, 2007 @ 11:07 pm

Hey Eli,
I may not always be able to implement all your strategies (like the power indexing technique for example), but they’re always uber cool in concept.
Keep up the fracking good content.
Props to ya!

#18 Comment By Matt Larson On February 22, 2007 @ 9:22 am

Eli, you’re a freaking genious. Thanks, dude.

#19 Comment By Rich On February 24, 2007 @ 1:21 am

You can do this in cPanel using the hotlink icon.

#20 Comment By TheOperative On February 24, 2007 @ 3:18 am

I wish there were something to be done about people copy and pasting your unique content on their site too, and then hotlinking the images as well. I found a site doing that, I want to kick that guy’s ass.

#21 Comment By Robb On February 26, 2007 @ 8:49 pm

I’ve never done much with htaccess, but i see theres a lot it can do. awesome post. would it be feasable to name the mp3 file an actual song name, instead of hotlinked, this way when they download the file, it looks like the real thing to them instead of hotlinked.mp3? Would be funny if they actually uploaded to myspace, ect.

#22 Comment By Tudor Mateescu On February 28, 2007 @ 9:28 am

I would point that, an image hot linked is in the end a link. The people who are hot linking your images are helping you to rank in images serps and with this technique hot linking is Great ;)

#23 Comment By Eli On February 28, 2007 @ 9:47 am

you can name it whatever you would like just change the last line
RewriteRule [^hotlinked].(mp3)$ [2] http://www.mydomain.com/hotlinked.mp3 [R,NC]
to:
RewriteRule [^whatever].(mp3)$ [3] http://www.mydomain.com/whatever.mp3 [R,NC]

you’ll notice though that it doesn’t matter what the filename is called. It is not a redirect it is a rewrite. meaning when they save it or play it it still appears to be whatever mp3 they are pulling.
Just like in modrewrites with html.

#24 Comment By Alles On March 12, 2007 @ 12:11 pm

Eli, is it possible instead of substituing good pic with a totally different pic to make a viewer redirected to my site? Something like

img xsrc=�?http://realdomain.com/realpicture.jpg�? onload=�?coded script�?

used by doorwayers to redirect visitors to their sites?

My pics being hotlinked is the real problem for me, so today I tried to implement your advice - actually, it was easier to do so via cPanel HotLink Protection but I do understand that your method is more flexible :) - thanks for a good advice.

#25 Comment By Gene On May 14, 2007 @ 11:15 am

Great post, many thanks man.

#26 Comment By Water slides On June 30, 2007 @ 4:55 am

#27 Comment By Stefanie On April 8, 2008 @ 3:01 pm

Great guide. I’ve done the promotional image thing substitution thing before, but ever since I came across the “Uncle Dirty” photo series, I’ve found his images to be a much more entertaining alternative.

#28 Comment By Eva White On May 10, 2008 @ 9:40 pm

I’m feeling like a fish out of water. Need to get a revision in programming to be able to use half your tips.

#29 Comment By lpdesigner On June 29, 2008 @ 9:33 am

haha i was trying to figure out how to keep people from hotlinking my mp3s last week and couldn’t find anything on google. i was on this blog reading up on some of your SEO articles and thank god this came up. thanks man

#30 Comment By PS3 On July 16, 2008 @ 6:57 am

Great post. Many thanks Eli! Your a star

#31 Comment By Geeks DIY On July 16, 2008 @ 1:38 pm

.htaccess is something that I don’t know too much about but it seems very powerful. Thanks for sharing some examples

#32 Comment By Ryan On August 14, 2008 @ 1:03 am

Alas such a great tip, this really is a good way to get some more visitors to your site and deal with annoying hot linkers.

#33 Comment By Getting Rid Of Acne On February 3, 2009 @ 7:57 pm

Really good tip, thanks for the info. gotta hate all the hot linkers.

#34 Comment By Fat Loss For Idiots Review On February 3, 2009 @ 10:39 pm

What I really like about your posts of this nature is that you always find a way for it to benefit you as apposed to doing something to stop it completely, which is sometimes impossible.

#35 Comment By ShellMedia On April 9, 2009 @ 11:43 am

Is there any value to people hotlinking your images?

Let’s say for the sake of argument that bandwidth is not an issue here.

If I allow all of the images on my site to be hotlinked, and say thousands of people post them in forums, on blogs, etc. All of the images are being served from images.mydomain.com. Will images.mydomain.com get any PR because of this?

Could hotlinked images be considered ‘votes’ by G and other major search engines?

#36 Comment By Suzy On June 17, 2009 @ 12:23 pm

ShellMedia,
That’s a good question but my guess would be no. It’s not an outgoing link from the other site, it’s a request to pull an image and display it. It’s not linking to any page. So no, there is no benefit in my eyes.

#37 Comment By noone On July 9, 2009 @ 11:26 pm

You’re a fag.

#38 Comment By work at home On July 17, 2009 @ 2:03 pm

Great tips! .htaccess is really important…trust me I know…

#39 Comment By Payday Uk On October 9, 2009 @ 2:44 am

If this is blog, this is long. Furthermore if this is article, you are the expert for this. Thanks

#40 Comment By Jibmo On January 6, 2010 @ 4:51 pm

a hotlinker is using my bandwidth and swf files to earn themselves some adsense revenue. is there a .htaccess redirect without having to use flash - I havent got flash??

I would like to earn some free advertising back :-)

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As a matter of fact, it is a nice stuff. Thanks

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#45 Comment By SEO Miami On November 28, 2010 @ 12:47 pm

I was looking for something similar awhile back for this exact thing. Nice job with the post!

#46 Comment By Wireless Networking On December 17, 2010 @ 6:27 am

you truly are an expert on this field. and very smart too.

#47 Comment By high-end On December 17, 2010 @ 8:09 am

nice blog. keep it up!

#48 Comment By Best Hosting companies reviews On January 5, 2011 @ 7:43 pm

Good observation that hotlinkers eat up your bandwidth.

#49 Comment By Singapore SEO Consultant On January 20, 2011 @ 10:03 am

They slow down your server as well.

#50 Comment By birdy On June 22, 2011 @ 10:04 pm

Old post, but the information are always new for new comers. Very informative post indeed. Would you recommended any measure or tips for the blogger.com users to deal with hot linkers?

#51 Comment By Handbags On Sale On August 14, 2011 @ 6:42 pm

I do agree with all of the ideas you have presented in your post. They’re really convincing and will definitely work. Still, the posts are too short for newbies. Could you please extend them a bit from next time? Thanks for the post.

#52 Comment By Corporate law On August 28, 2011 @ 2:23 pm

sorry but i don’t understand your post at all.

#53 Comment By Not so average On September 8, 2011 @ 10:48 pm

I was using .htaccess to stop hotlinkers, but I found it caused problems with my site. My host offers unlimited bandwidth anyway and I couldnt risk upsetting my users due to my stuffed up .htaccess

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I’ve been meaning to start a video blog for some time now

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#61 Comment By Website translation On January 1, 2012 @ 12:27 pm

That’s a nice neat trick against those pesty hotlinkers that steal your bandwidth…

#62 Comment By Summer Holidays On January 1, 2012 @ 10:10 pm

This is one of the best writing styles online. Keep up the good work, and thank you for opening my eyes to a new form of online marketing.

#63 Comment By Nitish On January 6, 2012 @ 12:30 pm

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#64 Comment By Nitish On January 6, 2012 @ 12:31 pm

Yeah but the way is way old fashioned now, don’t know whether it still works

#65 Comment By Nitish On January 6, 2012 @ 12:32 pm

And now he is off the hook… Didnt see him post anything from past 6+ months

#66 Comment By Nitish On January 6, 2012 @ 12:32 pm

You are one as well xD

#67 Comment By Nitish On January 6, 2012 @ 12:33 pm

now u are just over exaggerating lol

#68 Comment By Ismat Zahra On January 8, 2012 @ 6:04 am

my my…. nice…

#69 Comment By Ismat Zahra On January 8, 2012 @ 6:04 am

realy gr8 and worthwhile

#70 Comment By Ismat Zahra On January 8, 2012 @ 6:05 am

keep doing thiss…. i lyk almost all the articless i read till now…. ;)

#71 Comment By Ismat Zahra On January 8, 2012 @ 6:05 am

helpfull.. and keep it up :)

#72 Comment By Hot Pinoy Celebs On January 11, 2012 @ 3:59 am

Great post Eli, I learn new things every time I come here.

#73 Comment By Intel Core On February 8, 2012 @ 12:55 pm

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#74 Comment By Classificados On March 6, 2012 @ 2:51 pm

Thanks for this article, very interesting.

#75 Comment By Crafts Factory On March 11, 2012 @ 3:06 am

missing the name of your suggested tool, cymplus..

#76 Comment By HealthWrong On March 20, 2012 @ 10:06 pm

i love to hot link but i do not overdo it.

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#78 Comment By Justbeenpaid On April 29, 2012 @ 8:51 am

Thank you Eli
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#80 Comment By Mercy Ministries On July 17, 2012 @ 3:41 pm

Thank you for this one. Thew content of the comment should be related to the topic of that site. You can use contextual strategy where you insert your anchor text in your comment.

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#82 Comment By security guard resume On August 21, 2012 @ 10:50 pm

Nice article, and great blog overall. How do you go about managing all these large networks of sites.

#83 Comment By hut be phot On September 2, 2012 @ 6:03 pm

s there an easy way to determine whether you’re being hotlinked? Or do you just do an image search on the major search engines?

#84 Comment By thong cong On September 2, 2012 @ 10:44 pm

Eli, you’re a freaking genious. Thanks, dude.

#85 Comment By thong cong On September 8, 2012 @ 6:34 am

Heheh - perfect!


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URL to article: http://www.BlueHatSEO.com/dealing-with-those-pesky-hotlinkers/

URLs in this post:
[1] go here: http://javascriptkit.com/howto/htaccess.shtml
[2] http://www.mydomain.com/hotlinked.mp3: http://www.mydomain.com/hotlinked.mp3
[3] http://www.mydomain.com/whatever.mp3: http://www.mydomain.com/whatever.mp3
[4] http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/blog/use-google-images-and-hotlinkers-to-build-links/: http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/blog/use-google-images-and-hotlinkers-to-build-links/

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