{"id":8898,"date":"2006-03-28T06:56:48","date_gmt":"2006-03-28T13:56:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2006\/03\/28\/protecting-your-image-with-htaccess.html"},"modified":"2006-03-28T06:56:48","modified_gmt":"2006-03-28T13:56:48","slug":"protecting_your","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/03\/28\/protecting_your.html","title":{"rendered":"Protecting your image (with .htaccess)"},"content":{"rendered":"

As part of tracking the current spam problem (and the changes I made to the MT cgi directory yesterday did abruptly cut off all the error log messages — and, I’ll note, all the junk trackbacks that have gotten through — more on that later), I noted in my access logs a lot — I mean a lot — of image theft. Folks — mostly in myspace.com <\/em>— linking directly through to images on my blog, rather than hosting the images on their own site (and using their own bandwidth).<\/p>\n

Now, most of those images were copied down here by me for fair use purposes, so I can’t object too strenuously on IP grounds. But it’s not their using the images per se<\/em>, but the “bandwidth theft” and server traffic impact on me that’s a problem. Someone is, essentially, making their <\/em>page all pretty on the back of my <\/em>account’s bandwidth, interfering to some degree with your <\/em>ability to come here and see my <\/em>pretty page.<\/p>\n

I have no idea of the impact of this, though, anecdotally, it can be a serious problem on some sites. But it’s a known discourtesy, and folks have come up with any number of ways to prevent it.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

E.g.:<\/p>\n