Miscellaneous Hacks - Ban Spiders by User Agent

What this mod does
With this mod you can enter User Agents to watch or ban, you can also recieve emails or have an Output.txt created and updated with time and date of visits. It doesn't just have to be spiders, you can watch, log or ban any useragent!

How to install
Simply import the product ban_spider, the mod is active by default but none of the other options are turned on.

What is a UserAgent?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent

Understanding a UserAgent string
http://user-agent-string.info/parse

Genuine User Getting Blocked?
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=105

Tools to help
http://whatsmyuseragent.com/SwitchingUserAgents.asp
http://www.botsvsbrowsers.com/SimulateUserAgent.asp

FAQ
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=137

How does it work?
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=381

What's a bot?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spambot

How do i ban a bot?
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=318
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....7&postcount=51

Where's output.txt located?
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=216

Bad bot lists
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=259
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=224
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showpost....&postcount=281

Tested on vb3.7.x, vB3.8.x , vB4.x.x but should work on any version.

__________________________________________________ __________________
Special thanks to:
Lior
KH99
BoP5
for helping me sort out a few issues

...and beta testers
ForceHSS (Special thanks to Force for latest testing)
ozzy47
GreyHost

If you use this please mark as INSTALLED

History
9th June 2011 Orginal xml added
12th June 2011 Added both email notification and text file logging
22nd June 2011 Version 2.0.0, Added create thread on activity

1. Added match facility you can now use something like Yandex and it will match MOZILLA/5.0 (COMPATIBLE; YANDEXBOT/3.0; +HTTP://YANDEX.COM/BOTS)
2. Added clickable link to visited thread

22nd September 2011 added user redirect url selection
08th October Beta testing started for thread creation.
20th October Beta testing started for emailing.
21st October Beta testing complete Ver 3.0.0 uploaded
29th October minor fix added to cope with empty userid on thread creation
30th October Beta testing automatic redirection to spiders/bots IP
31st October New xml uploaded with automatic redirect to IP
25th November Minor fix for blank forumid fixed
26th November 2011 Fixed version check & create thread Off by default
17th December 2014 Version 3.1.0 uploaded, Hook changed extra logging and statistics added by Ozzy47 (Chris)
18th December 2014 Version 3.1.1 uploaded, prevented spiders being counted when mod turned off.
17th December 2014 Version 3.1.2 uploaded, due to rogue code from another mod
The Bad Bots list is now included in the product
Please prune out all those that you wish to be able to see your site (i suggest you definately prune out "DA" and "Custo" :

Support will now only be given to those who have this mod marked as INSTALLED

[KidHTML]

Originally Posted by Max Taxable

Personally I wouldn't block any of these.

I wasn't sure if I should or not...

[Max Taxable]

Originally Posted by KidHTML

I wasn't sure if I should or not...

I posted a list of the ones I block, earlier in this thread. All are there for very good reason. They aren't helpful to the site, they leech too much resources, or they are typically botnet zombies. Bad actors all.

[Simon Lloyd]

Thanks for the help Max

[Max Taxable]

Originally Posted by Simon Lloyd

Thanks for the help Max

Heh. I never explained how to use your Mod....

[Simon Lloyd]

Originally Posted by Max Taxable

Heh. I never explained how to use your Mod....

I was under the impression that it was self explanatory, maybe i should add to the first post?

[Max Taxable]

Originally Posted by Simon Lloyd

I was under the impression that it was self explanatory, maybe i should add to the first post?

I got the same impression...

[Willy T]

I must say..... This was the only thing I found to get rid of those damn Baidu spiders! I averaged 50 - 65 baidu spiders at one time. I often had almost as many guests online as I did users.

Now I am perfectly fine with 1-5 google & bing spiders online. 50+ spiders that simply don't help me? yea... No thanks!

[Max Taxable]

Baidu is evil.

[Nichtofen]

This mod is great! I cannot express how wonderful this mod is and how well it works. Tie that into how responsive and resourceful Simon is and it's a winner. Thanks for all the help and clarification within the comments to Simon, Max, Force, and all!

My forum is young and relatively slow as it were, but I wish to stay ahead of the game on this one and keep my security up as the server load increases. I don't see the spiders that were stopping by for a visit anymore.

Thanks again and keep up the good work
Marked Installed and Nominated

vB4.2.0

[Simon Lloyd]

Glad you like it and it works well for you, i think your our first vb4.2.x so it's good to know it works upward

I know it's a pain but do familiarise yourself with the info that can be found at the links in the first post, these will help you as your forum gets busier, also take the time to research some of the bots, they're not all bad, some will even help your site grow.

Be mindful about who and which nations you are going to cater for before banning/allowing bots to crawl your site and you'll be golden.