How can one detect the search engine bots using php?
18 Answers
Here's a Search Engine Directory of Spider names
Then you use $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']; to check if the agent is said spider.
if(strstr(strtolower($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']), "googlebot"))
{
// what to do
}
Check the $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'] for some of the strings listed here:
http://www.useragentstring.com/pages/useragentstring.php
Or more specifically for crawlers:
http://www.useragentstring.com/pages/useragentstring.php?typ=Crawler
If you want to -say- log the number of visits of most common search engine crawlers, you could use
$interestingCrawlers = array( 'google', 'yahoo' );
$pattern = '/(' . implode('|', $interestingCrawlers) .')/';
$matches = array();
$numMatches = preg_match($pattern, strtolower($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']), $matches, 'i');
if($numMatches > 0) // Found a match
{
// $matches[1] contains an array of all text matches to either 'google' or 'yahoo'
}
If you really need to detect GOOGLE engine bots you should never rely on "user_agent" or "IP" address because "user_agent" can be changed and acording to what google said in: Verifying Googlebot
To verify Googlebot as the caller:
1.Run a reverse DNS lookup on the accessing IP address from your logs, using the host command.
2.Verify that the domain name is in either googlebot.com or google.com
3.Run a forward DNS lookup on the domain name retrieved in step 1 using the host command on the retrieved domain name. Verify that it is the same as the original accessing IP address from your logs.
Here is my tested code :
<?php
$remote_add=$_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];
$hostname = gethostbyaddr($remote_add);
$googlebot = 'googlebot.com';
$google = 'google.com';
if (stripos(strrev($hostname), strrev($googlebot)) === 0 or stripos(strrev($hostname),strrev($google)) === 0 )
{
//add your code
}
?>
In this code we check "hostname" which should contain "googlebot.com" or "google.com" at the end of "hostname" which is really important to check exact domain not subdomain. I hope you enjoy ;)
I use this function ... part of the regex comes from prestashop but I added some more bot to it.
public function isBot()
{
$bot_regex = '/BotLink|bingbot|AhrefsBot|ahoy|AlkalineBOT|anthill|appie|arale|araneo|AraybOt|ariadne|arks|ATN_Worldwide|Atomz|bbot|Bjaaland|Ukonline|borg\-bot\/0\.9|boxseabot|bspider|calif|christcrawler|CMC\/0\.01|combine|confuzzledbot|CoolBot|cosmos|Internet Cruiser Robot|cusco|cyberspyder|cydralspider|desertrealm, desert realm|digger|DIIbot|grabber|downloadexpress|DragonBot|dwcp|ecollector|ebiness|elfinbot|esculapio|esther|fastcrawler|FDSE|FELIX IDE|ESI|fido|H�m�h�kki|KIT\-Fireball|fouineur|Freecrawl|gammaSpider|gazz|gcreep|golem|googlebot|griffon|Gromit|gulliver|gulper|hambot|havIndex|hotwired|htdig|iajabot|INGRID\/0\.1|Informant|InfoSpiders|inspectorwww|irobot|Iron33|JBot|jcrawler|Teoma|Jeeves|jobo|image\.kapsi\.net|KDD\-Explorer|ko_yappo_robot|label\-grabber|larbin|legs|Linkidator|linkwalker|Lockon|logo_gif_crawler|marvin|mattie|mediafox|MerzScope|NEC\-MeshExplorer|MindCrawler|udmsearch|moget|Motor|msnbot|muncher|muninn|MuscatFerret|MwdSearch|sharp\-info\-agent|WebMechanic|NetScoop|newscan\-online|ObjectsSearch|Occam|Orbsearch\/1\.0|packrat|pageboy|ParaSite|patric|pegasus|perlcrawler|phpdig|piltdownman|Pimptrain|pjspider|PlumtreeWebAccessor|PortalBSpider|psbot|Getterrobo\-Plus|Raven|RHCS|RixBot|roadrunner|Robbie|robi|RoboCrawl|robofox|Scooter|Search\-AU|searchprocess|Senrigan|Shagseeker|sift|SimBot|Site Valet|skymob|SLCrawler\/2\.0|slurp|ESI|snooper|solbot|speedy|spider_monkey|SpiderBot\/1\.0|spiderline|nil|suke|http:\/\/www\.sygol\.com|tach_bw|TechBOT|templeton|titin|topiclink|UdmSearch|urlck|Valkyrie libwww\-perl|verticrawl|Victoria|void\-bot|Voyager|VWbot_K|crawlpaper|wapspider|WebBandit\/1\.0|webcatcher|T\-H\-U\-N\-D\-E\-R\-S\-T\-O\-N\-E|WebMoose|webquest|webreaper|webs|webspider|WebWalker|wget|winona|whowhere|wlm|WOLP|WWWC|none|XGET|Nederland\.zoek|AISearchBot|woriobot|NetSeer|Nutch|YandexBot|YandexMobileBot|SemrushBot|FatBot|MJ12bot|DotBot|AddThis|baiduspider|SeznamBot|mod_pagespeed|CCBot|openstat.ru\/Bot|m2e/i';
$userAgent = empty($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']) ? FALSE : $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'];
$isBot = !$userAgent || preg_match($bot_regex, $userAgent);
return $isBot;
}
Anyway take care that some bots uses browser like user agent to fake their identity
( I got many russian ip that has this behaviour on my site )
One distinctive feature of most of the bot is that they don't carry any cookie and so no session is attached to them.
( I am not sure how but this is for sure the best way to track them )
You could analyse the user agent ($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']) or compare the client’s IP address ($_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR']) with a list of IP addresses of search engine bots.
<?php // IPCLOACK HOOK
if (CLOAKING_LEVEL != 4) {
$lastupdated = date("Ymd", filemtime(FILE_BOTS));
if ($lastupdated != date("Ymd")) {
$lists = array(
'http://labs.getyacg.com/spiders/google.txt',
'http://labs.getyacg.com/spiders/inktomi.txt',
'http://labs.getyacg.com/spiders/lycos.txt',
'http://labs.getyacg.com/spiders/msn.txt',
'http://labs.getyacg.com/spiders/altavista.txt',
'http://labs.getyacg.com/spiders/askjeeves.txt',
'http://labs.getyacg.com/spiders/wisenut.txt',
);
foreach($lists as $list) {
$opt .= fetch($list);
}
$opt = preg_replace("/(^[\r\n]*|[\r\n]+)[\s\t]*[\r\n]+/", "\n", $opt);
$fp = fopen(FILE_BOTS,"w");
fwrite($fp,$opt);
fclose($fp);
}
$ip = isset($_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR']) ? $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'] : '';
$ref = isset($_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER']) ? $_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER'] : '';
$agent = isset($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']) ? $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'] : '';
$host = strtolower(gethostbyaddr($ip));
$file = implode(" ", file(FILE_BOTS));
$exp = explode(".", $ip);
$class = $exp[0].'.'.$exp[1].'.'.$exp[2].'.';
$threshold = CLOAKING_LEVEL;
$cloak = 0;
if (stristr($host, "googlebot") && stristr($host, "inktomi") && stristr($host, "msn")) {
$cloak++;
}
if (stristr($file, $class)) {
$cloak++;
}
if (stristr($file, $agent)) {
$cloak++;
}
if (strlen($ref) > 0) {
$cloak = 0;
}
if ($cloak >= $threshold) {
$cloakdirective = 1;
} else {
$cloakdirective = 0;
}
}
?>
That would be the ideal way to cloak for spiders. It's from an open source script called [YACG] - http://getyacg.com
Needs a bit of work, but definitely the way to go.
I made one good and fast function for this
function is_bot(){
if(isset($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']))
{
return preg_match('/rambler|abacho|acoi|accona|aspseek|altavista|estyle|scrubby|lycos|geona|ia_archiver|alexa|sogou|skype|facebook|twitter|pinterest|linkedin|naver|bing|google|yahoo|duckduckgo|yandex|baidu|teoma|xing|java\/1.7.0_45|bot|crawl|slurp|spider|mediapartners|\sask\s|\saol\s/i', $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']);
}
return false;
}
This cover 99% of all possible bots, search engines etc.
100% Working Bot detector. It is working on my website successfully.
function isBotDetected() {
if ( preg_match('/abacho|accona|AddThis|AdsBot|ahoy|AhrefsBot|AISearchBot|alexa|altavista|anthill|appie|applebot|arale|araneo|AraybOt|ariadne|arks|aspseek|ATN_Worldwide|Atomz|baiduspider|baidu|bbot|bingbot|bing|Bjaaland|BlackWidow|BotLink|bot|boxseabot|bspider|calif|CCBot|ChinaClaw|christcrawler|CMC\/0\.01|combine|confuzzledbot|contaxe|CoolBot|cosmos|crawler|crawlpaper|crawl|curl|cusco|cyberspyder|cydralspider|dataprovider|digger|DIIbot|DotBot|downloadexpress|DragonBot|DuckDuckBot|dwcp|EasouSpider|ebiness|ecollector|elfinbot|esculapio|ESI|esther|eStyle|Ezooms|facebookexternalhit|facebook|facebot|fastcrawler|FatBot|FDSE|FELIX IDE|fetch|fido|find|Firefly|fouineur|Freecrawl|froogle|gammaSpider|gazz|gcreep|geona|Getterrobo-Plus|get|girafabot|golem|googlebot|\-google|grabber|GrabNet|griffon|Gromit|gulliver|gulper|hambot|havIndex|hotwired|htdig|HTTrack|ia_archiver|iajabot|IDBot|Informant|InfoSeek|InfoSpiders|INGRID\/0\.1|inktomi|inspectorwww|Internet Cruiser Robot|irobot|Iron33|JBot|jcrawler|Jeeves|jobo|KDD\-Explorer|KIT\-Fireball|ko_yappo_robot|label\-grabber|larbin|legs|libwww-perl|linkedin|Linkidator|linkwalker|Lockon|logo_gif_crawler|Lycos|m2e|majesticsEO|marvin|mattie|mediafox|mediapartners|MerzScope|MindCrawler|MJ12bot|mod_pagespeed|moget|Motor|msnbot|muncher|muninn|MuscatFerret|MwdSearch|NationalDirectory|naverbot|NEC\-MeshExplorer|NetcraftSurveyAgent|NetScoop|NetSeer|newscan\-online|nil|none|Nutch|ObjectsSearch|Occam|openstat.ru\/Bot|packrat|pageboy|ParaSite|patric|pegasus|perlcrawler|phpdig|piltdownman|Pimptrain|pingdom|pinterest|pjspider|PlumtreeWebAccessor|PortalBSpider|psbot|rambler|Raven|RHCS|RixBot|roadrunner|Robbie|robi|RoboCrawl|robofox|Scooter|Scrubby|Search\-AU|searchprocess|search|SemrushBot|Senrigan|seznambot|Shagseeker|sharp\-info\-agent|sift|SimBot|Site Valet|SiteSucker|skymob|SLCrawler\/2\.0|slurp|snooper|solbot|speedy|spider_monkey|SpiderBot\/1\.0|spiderline|spider|suke|tach_bw|TechBOT|TechnoratiSnoop|templeton|teoma|titin|topiclink|twitterbot|twitter|UdmSearch|Ukonline|UnwindFetchor|URL_Spider_SQL|urlck|urlresolver|Valkyrie libwww\-perl|verticrawl|Victoria|void\-bot|Voyager|VWbot_K|wapspider|WebBandit\/1\.0|webcatcher|WebCopier|WebFindBot|WebLeacher|WebMechanic|WebMoose|webquest|webreaper|webspider|webs|WebWalker|WebZip|wget|whowhere|winona|wlm|WOLP|woriobot|WWWC|XGET|xing|yahoo|YandexBot|YandexMobileBot|yandex|yeti|Zeus/i', $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'])
) {
return true; // 'Above given bots detected'
}
return false;
} // End :: isBotDetected()
I'm using this code, pretty good. You will very easy to know user-agents visitted your site. This code is opening a file and write the user_agent down the file. You can check each day this file by go to yourdomain.com/useragent.txt and know about new user_agents and put them in your condition of if clause.
$user_agent = strtolower($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']);
if(!preg_match("/Googlebot|MJ12bot|yandexbot/i", $user_agent)){
// if not meet the conditions then
// do what you need
// here open a file and write the user_agent down the file. You can check each day this file useragent.txt and know about new user_agents and put them in your condition of if clause
if($user_agent!=""){
$myfile = fopen("useragent.txt", "a") or die("Unable to open file useragent.txt!");
fwrite($myfile, $user_agent);
$user_agent = "\n";
fwrite($myfile, $user_agent);
fclose($myfile);
}
}
This is the content of useragent.txt
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Googlebot/2.1; +http://www.google.com/bot.html)
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MJ12bot/v1.4.6; http://mj12bot.com/)Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Googlebot/2.1; +http://www.google.com/bot.html)
Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; Android 6.0.1; Nexus 5X Build/MMB29P) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/41.0.2272.96 Mobile Safari/537.36 (compatible; Googlebot/2.1; +http://www.google.com/bot.html)mozilla/5.0 (compatible; yandexbot/3.0; +http://yandex.com/bots)
mozilla/5.0 (compatible; yandexbot/3.0; +http://yandex.com/bots)
mozilla/5.0 (compatible; yandexbot/3.0; +http://yandex.com/bots)
mozilla/5.0 (compatible; yandexbot/3.0; +http://yandex.com/bots)
mozilla/5.0 (compatible; yandexbot/3.0; +http://yandex.com/bots)
mozilla/5.0 (iphone; cpu iphone os 9_3 like mac os x) applewebkit/601.1.46 (khtml, like gecko) version/9.0 mobile/13e198 safari/601.1
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64) applewebkit/537.36 (khtml, like gecko) chrome/53.0.2785.143 safari/537.36
mozilla/5.0 (compatible; linkdexbot/2.2; +http://www.linkdex.com/bots/)
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:49.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/49.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:33.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/33.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:49.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/49.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:33.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/33.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:49.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/49.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:33.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/33.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:49.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/49.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64; rv:33.0) gecko/20100101 firefox/33.0
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64) applewebkit/537.36 (khtml, like gecko) chrome/53.0.2785.143 safari/537.36
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 6.1; wow64) applewebkit/537.36 (khtml, like gecko) chrome/53.0.2785.143 safari/537.36
mozilla/5.0 (compatible; baiduspider/2.0; +http://www.baidu.com/search/spider.html)
zoombot (linkbot 1.0 http://suite.seozoom.it/bot.html)
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 10.0; wow64) applewebkit/537.36 (khtml, like gecko) chrome/44.0.2403.155 safari/537.36 opr/31.0.1889.174
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 10.0; wow64) applewebkit/537.36 (khtml, like gecko) chrome/44.0.2403.155 safari/537.36 opr/31.0.1889.174
sogou web spider/4.0(+http://www.sogou.com/docs/help/webmasters.htm#07)
mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 10.0; wow64) applewebkit/537.36 (khtml, like gecko) chrome/44.0.2403.155 safari/537.36 opr/31.0.1889.174
For Google i'm using this method.
function is_google() {
$ip = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];
$host = gethostbyaddr( $ip );
if ( strpos( $host, '.google.com' ) !== false || strpos( $host, '.googlebot.com' ) !== false ) {
$forward_lookup = gethostbyname( $host );
if ( $forward_lookup == $ip ) {
return true;
}
return false;
} else {
return false;
}
}
var_dump( is_google() );
might be late, but what about a hidden a link. All bots will use the rel attribute follow, only bad bots will use the nofollow rel attribute.
<a style="display:none;" rel="follow" href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="isabot();">.</a>
function isabot(){
//define a variable to pass with ajax to php
// || send bots info direct to where ever.
isabot = true;
}
for a bad bot you can use this:
<a style="display:none;" href="javascript:void(0);" rel="nofollow" onclick="isBadbot();">.</a>
for PHP specific you can remove the onclick attribute and replace the href attribute with a link to your ip detector/ bot detector like so:
<a style="display:none;" rel="follow" href="https://somedomain.com/botdetector.php">.</a>
OR
<a style="display:none;" rel="nofollow" href="https://somedomain.com/badbotdetector.php">.</a>
you can work with it and maybe use both, one detects a bot, while the other proves it to be a bad bot.
hope you find this useful
Verifying Googlebot
As useragent can be changed...
the only official supported way to identify a google bot is to run a reverse DNS lookup on the accessing IP address and run a forward DNS lookup on the result to verify that it points to accessing IP address and the resulting domain name is in either googlebot.com or google.com domain.
Taken from here.
so you must run a DNS lookup
Both, reverse and forward.
See this guide on Google Search Central.
function bot_detected() {
if(preg_match('/bot|crawl|slurp|spider|mediapartners/i', $_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT']){
return true;
}
else{
return false;
}
}
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