Image Replacement help.

Ancodi · 12-18-2006, 10:58 PM

Ok, On a certain page of my website, there are 100 (99 excluding the banner) images. But, to avoid hotlinking, is there a way I can replace the image, if hotlinked, with another image saying "DON'T HOTLINK!" Kind of like the .co.nr button if you hotlink it. Or Tripod. Can you tell me simple please. Ta!

Izzmo · 12-21-2006, 09:40 AM

Well, I know cPanel offers a simple option in there setup that allows you to do that very easily.

What kind of Control Panel do you have for your website?

andheresjohnny · 12-21-2006, 02:02 PM

This can be accomplished via the .htaccess file.

Example:

Code:

RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?alloweddomain.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?alloweddomain2.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?alloweddomain3.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.google.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.googlebot.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.msn.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.msnbot.msn.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.inktomisearch.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.looksmart.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteRule \.(gif|jpe?g|png|bmp)$ /images/embarrasingimage.gif [L,NC]

1. The following lines allow your domains to hotlink to the pictures (replace "alloweddomain", "alloweddomain2", etc ... with your domain names).

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?alloweddomain.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?alloweddomain2.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(www\.)?alloweddomain3.com(/)?.*$ [NC]

2. The following lines allow the bots to get to your pictures.

Code:

RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.google.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.googlebot.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.msn.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.msnbot.msn.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.inktomisearch.com(/)?.*$ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://(.+)\.looksmart.com(/)?.*$ [NC]

3. The following line says for all other domains, if someone tries to hotlink to a gif, jpe, jpg, png or bmp ... then replace that image with whatever you have stored at /images/embarrasingimage.gif.

Code:

RewriteRule \.(gif|jpe?g|png|bmp)$ /images/embarrasingimage.gif [L,NC]

I believe this is correct. Just place this code into your .htaccess in every root domain you want protected.

Izzmo · 12-22-2006, 12:29 PM

Wow.. cool, I never knew u could do that

Thanks Johnny.

andheresjohnny · 12-22-2006, 12:37 PM

Thanks.

I believe you can test it by accessing it via a proxy.

I had some sites hot-linking to some of my images and I did the same thing .. except instead of showing a substitue graphic I just deny the access outright.

ie; change the last line:

Code:

RewriteRule \.(gif|jpe?g|png|bmp)$ /images/embarrasingimage.gif [L,NC]

to:

Code:

RewriteRule .*\.(gif|jpe?g|png|bmp)$ [F,NC]

If you deny the access outright then you don't take a bandwidth hit. If you substitue a humiliating picture (or one with your url on it) then of course you will still use bandwidth.