Even though people can see the meme on Website B’s site, the origin server is still storing it. In other words, server resources from Website A are used every time a user views the hotlinked image. If Website B receives high traffic, a significant amount of Website A’s server resources will be used.<\/p>
This article will explain why you should avoid hotlinking and how to stop doing it. For web administrators, we provide four methods to protect your website from hotlinks: using hPanel, an FTP client, a content delivery network (CDN), and WordPress plugins.<\/p> \n\n\n\n\n<\/p> It’s a fact that hotlinking negatively impacts website owners the most. For those who do it, hotlinking might seem like an easy way to acquire website assets, but in reality, hotlinking can harm them too.<\/p> Let’s go over the five main reasons why you should avoid hotlinking at all costs:<\/p> Now that you’ve learned why you should stop hotlinking, you might be wondering what to do instead when you would like to use images from other websites.<\/p> The most important part is making sure that you’ve been given the authorization to use the image. There are some images that you can acquire by simply asking for the owner’s permission. Others are under a strict legal license – for example, copyrighted photographs.<\/p> Once you’ve received the permission or took care of the legal process, you should upload the file to your own host or use a third-party provider. For images, use an image hosting service like Imgur<\/a>. This way, you will not be stealing bandwidth from the original website owner.<\/p> If, for any reason, you can’t acquire the image you want, try these alternatives:<\/p> Putting hotlink protection in place is very important to prevent issues related to content and bandwidth theft.<\/p> Before you proceed, keep in mind that hotlink protection won’t hurt your website’s presence in search results. As long as you don’t block search engines from indexing your images, your search engine optimization (SEO)<\/a> efforts will be unaffected.<\/p> Let’s go over four different methods to protect your assets from getting hotlinked.<\/p> If you host your website on Hostinger<\/a>, you can set up hotlink protection right from hPanel<\/a>. The process should be similar on other control panels. Follow these steps:<\/p> Another option is to edit your website’s .htaccess <\/strong>file by accessing it through an FTP client like FileZilla<\/a> or the file manager on your hosting account’s control panel.<\/p> Keep in mind that this method involves editing your website’s code, so be careful – a small error can render your site unusable.<\/p> Using a content delivery network (CDN)<\/a> for your website has many benefits. A CDN can increase content delivery speed, providing a better performance for your visitors. It can also offer asset management features for website administrators, hotlink protection being one of them.<\/p> The process of activating hotlink protection will vary depending on the CDN provider you use. The following tutorial will go over how to set up hotlink protection on two popular CDN providers – Cloudflare<\/a> and KeyCDN<\/a>.<\/p> Here’s how to activate hotlink protection on Cloudflare:<\/p> The Scrape Shield app by Cloudflare specifically prevents image hotlinking and supports .gif<\/strong>, .ico<\/strong>, .jpg<\/strong>, .jpeg<\/strong>, and .png<\/strong> file types.<\/p> Here’s how to activate hotlink protection on KeyCDN:<\/p> If you use WordPress as your website’s content management system<\/a> (CMS), there are several WordPress plugins<\/a> available that can prevent hotlinking. We’ll go over three of them.<\/p> The first one is the All In One WP Security and Firewall<\/a> plugin, which can automatically edit your website’s .htaccess <\/strong>file to prevent hotlinks. Follow these steps to set it up:<\/p> Another plugin you can use is WP Content Copy Protection & No Right Click<\/a>. This plugin can block visitors from copying text and right-clicking on your website. If you enable the right-click prevention, your visitors won’t be able to find or save the direct link to your content files.<\/p> Here’s how to enable the right-click protection on your site using this plugin:<\/p> Secure Copy Content Protection and Content Locking<\/a> is another option to disable right-click and asset copying. Here’s how to set it up:<\/p> Hotlinking is the act of copying assets, usually images, by linking the file directly from other websites without authorization.<\/p> It is a bad practice that negatively impacts web administrators. Hotlinking another website’s images can take up a significant amount of bandwidth on its server and infringe on its owners’ copyright.<\/p> We’ve explored different reasons why you should never hotlink and what you can do instead to obtain and share content assets. We also went over four methods to protect your website from hotlinking.<\/p> We hope that this article has helped you find better ways to acquire content and keep your site safe from bandwidth theft. Good luck.<\/p> How to Diagnose and Fix a Hacked Website<\/a> While hotlinking is considered bad manners in the online community, it’s not illegal in the EU or in the US to embed images without permission.<\/p> <\/div> ‘No hotlinking’ is a request aiming to limit others from directly linking to your website’s assets, and subsequently, stealing your website’s bandwidth.<\/p> <\/div> When you have hotlinking protection enabled, nobody can directly link to your website’s assets (like images and videos). This way, you can reserve bandwidth and ensure your website works the way it should.<\/p> <\/div> <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hotlinking is the act of using another site’s bandwidth by displaying their website asset – like an image, video, or audio file – on a different website via a direct web link. When this happens, the original website owner must cover and pay for these server resources each time a web browser wants to load […]<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2022\/11\/eBook-Speed-Up-your-website-1024x283.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>Reasons to Avoid Hotlinking<\/h2>
\n
How to Stop Hotlinking<\/h2>
\n
How to Protect Your Site From Getting Hotlinked<\/h2>
Method 1: Accessing hPanel Settings<\/h3>
\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/hpanel-advanced-hotlinkprotection-sidebar.png\")
<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/03\/hpanel-advanced-hotlinkprotection-configurehotlinkprotection.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>Method 2: Using an FTP Client<\/h3>
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
RewriteEngine on<\/code>RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$<\/code>RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?:\/\/(www.)?google.com [NC]<\/code>RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?:\/\/(www.)?bing.com [NC]<\/code>RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?:\/\/(www.)?yahoo.com [NC]<\/code>RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?:\/\/(www.)?yourdomain.com [NC]<\/code>RewriteRule .(jpg|jpeg|png|gif)$ – [NC,F,L]<\/code><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Method 3: Using a CDN<\/h3>
\n
![\"Scrape](\"\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/cloudflare-scrape-1024x467.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n
![\"Switch](\"\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/hotlink-protection-1024x463.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n
![\"KeyCDN,](\"\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/zone-referrer-1024x461.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n
![\"Select](\"\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/add-zone-1024x467.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n
Method 4: Using a WordPress Plugin<\/h3>
\n
![\"WP](\"\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/check-to-prevent-1024x460.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n
\n
![\"Copy](\"\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/right-click-protection-1024x294.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n
\n
![\"Activating](\"\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/10\/copy-protection-1024x372.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n
![\"Hostinger](\"https:\/\/www.hostinger.com\/tutorials\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/11\/Web-hosting_in-text-banner.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>Conclusion<\/h2>
Suggested Reading<\/h4>\n
\nWebsite Optimization<\/a>
\nHow to Clear Browser Cache and History<\/a>
\nHow to Inspect Element<\/a>
\nHow to Download a Website Backup<\/a>
\nHow to Check Your Website’s PHP Error Log<\/a><\/p>\n <\/div>\n\n\n\n<\/p>Hotlinking FAQ<\/h2>
Is Hotlinking Legal?<\/h3>
What Does No Hotlinking Mean?<\/h3>
What Is Hotlinking Protection?<\/h3>