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Denied Referrer
Mike Hudack
Editor-in-Chief
On Wednsday, June 9 of 1999, OSAll received word from a loyal reader that AntiOnline had placed OSAll on a `denied referrer list.´ In order to verify this information, an OSAll writer visited a story on Aviary-mag.com and tried to click through to a reference on AntiOnline.
Lo and behold, AntiOnline informed us that "The site that you visted before AntiOnline is a Denied Referer. What does this
mean? Basically, it means that AntiOnline does not allow the site that you just came from to link directly to AntiOnline content, or to utilize any resources that may be part of the AntiOnline Network." Since OSAll discovered it was on the blocked referrer list, Hacker News Network and Attrition.org have encountered the same problem.
In response, OSAll editor Mike Hudack sent an e-mail to John Vrasenivich, founder of AntiOnline. The e-mail said, in part, "OSAll has perpetrated no URL or referrer-based DoS attacks against AntiOnline and as such shouldn't be placed on such a list."
Usually, denied referrer lists, which are a feature of the Apache webserver AntiOnline uses, are used to prevent sites from using URL and referrer-based exploits against a website. In this case, however, as Mike Hudack told JP, no such attacks were performed. For that reason, there was no logical reasoning for such an action on AntiOnline´s part.
The e-mail continued, "Are you afraid of something we're linking to? Such a response is quite childish, immature and unprofessional. Aviary-mag.com is no more a threat to your site as a referrer than CNN.com is -- we've reported on the news as it happened.
OSAll has no control over whether or not our links to AntiOnline.com will operate properly. If they do not, however, you will be given the option to continue to the AntiOnline front page. If you like, do this and continue from there to what you wished to read. |
