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Hidden Traps with Robots.txt and GSC Gianna Brachetti-Truskawa DEEPL SE Speakerdeck.com/giannabrachetti @gianna-brachetti-truskawa @tentaclequing

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4 What‘s the fastest way to get your domain dexindexed? BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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5 Have your robots.txt respond with a 5xx! 5 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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6 Today, I want you to look beyond syntax … 6 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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7 Sometimes it‘s not what‘s in your robots.txt 7 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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8 … but what‘s outside of it 8 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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9 What you think it is: • A security guard • A law bots will have to obey • A tool to prevent testing environments from being accessible via the internet 9 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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10 What it really is: • An optional set of directives that crawlers can use to save on resources for crawl efficiency • A security risk 10 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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12 And it can cost you a lot of money

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13 1. What if you don‘t have a robots.txt? 2. What if you have one but it becomes unavailable? 3. Why can‘t you use it as a security guard? 4. What can you do to save yourself trouble? 13 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa What we‘re going to do today:

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14 Without a robots.txt, crawlers assume they can access all 14 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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15 Fine for small sites – for large sites, it helps to manage crawl budget more efficiently 15 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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16 But how would I reference my XML sitemap? 16 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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17 You‘re better off keeping it a secret! 17 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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Vulnerability reduction 18 Why would you hide your XML sitemap? Crawl control 18 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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19 Why would you hide your XML sitemap? Control who accesses your XML sitemap Use case: • Competitive intelligence in eCommerce 19 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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20 Why would you hide your XML sitemap? Make it harder to use the sitemap as a vector for attacks Use cases: • Scraping • (soft) DDoS attacks 20 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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21 What if your robots.txt becomes unavailable?

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22 22 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa Let‘s go back to this shocker:

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23 The devil is in the details documentation 23 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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Search Central Documentation: How Google interpretes the robots.txt specification² 24 Documentation Specified Robots.txt Web Standards and Google Documentation RFC 9309: Robots Exclusion Protocol (REP)1 Search Console Help: robots.txt report³ 1 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc9309.html 2 https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/robots/robots_txt 3 https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6062598?hl=en#crawl_errors Last access 30.09.2024

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25 25 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa Documentation Specified Robots.txt Web Standards and Google Documentation

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26 Google may cache your robots.txt for up to 24h 26 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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27 … or shorter if you limit caching 27 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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28 If you make changes, it can still take up to 24h until they‘re fetched 28 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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29 Robots.txt redirect chains can lead to it being ignored 29 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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• For all 4xx but 429 • Treat as allow all 429 (Too many requests) will be treated as 5xx 30 Client Errors 4xx What happens if Google cannot fetch your robots.txt anymore? • Status codes 400 – 499 • MAY be treated as allow all • First 12h: Stops crawling domain • <= 30 days: use last cached version • > 30 days: Check if the site is available in general, treat as allow all Confidential REP Search Console Help Search Central Documentation 30 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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If you have time- sensitive info, it might not be fetched on time 31 31 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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32 A 429 can lead to your domain being deindexed! 32 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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33 Server Errors 5xx What happens if Google cannot fetch your robots.txt anymore? • Treat as complete disallow • > 30 days: preferably use last cached version unless unavailable – else treat as 4xx (= allow all) • Treat 4xx and 5xx all the same: allow all REP Search Console Help Search Central Documentation 33 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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34 Server Errors 5xx Contradictions between known sources REP Search Console Help Search Central Documentation Gary Illyes 34 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa DISALLOW ALL ALLOW ALL DEINDEX ALL

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35 DNS errors, connection timeouts will be treated the same! 35 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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36 So which is it now, Google? 36 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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37 Why you can‘t use robots.txt as a security guard

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38 Error codes can lead to your robots.txt become a liability 38 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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39 … esp. if you 39 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa to hide secrets used it

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40 Robots.txt might tell us where the most interesting files might be 40 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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You’re relying on your robot.txt to keep things out of the internet 41 How your robots.txt can become a liability (even if it‘s a 200!) You’re exposing vulnerabilities of your website or servers You’re not monitoring the content or uptime of your robots.txt 41 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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42 Exposing sensitive information can become an expensive GDPR issue 42 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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43 Robots.txt emerged as a practical solution to real-world problems in the early web 43 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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44 But … Robots.txt is not legally binding! 44 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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45 Google may ignore it in some cases 45 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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46 46 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa Example Click tracking via parameters in URLs in prominent places https://www.deepl.com/pro?cta=header-prices

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47 47 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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48 If in doubt, Google may choose indexation over restriction 48 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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49 Best practices to avoid risks

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50 Limit access with more reliable methods! 50 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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51 Want to remove leaked data from the web? 51 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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52 Remove leaked data from the web: 410 (gone) X-Robots-Tag: none 52 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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53 Want to protect data from leaking into the web? 53 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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54 Protect data from the web: HTTP Authentication X-Robots-Tag: none Avoid internal links 54 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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55 Want to make it hard to spy on you or train genAI with your content? 55 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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56 Rate limiting Path obfuscation Serve different versions 56 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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57 Example by @pandraus, 03.07.2024 57 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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58 Monitor content and uptime! 58 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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59 GSC shows you versions and status of your robots.txt 59 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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60 Uptime / Status Code Monitoring 60 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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61 Monitor Search Console error classes 61 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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62 Set filters for WNC- and the error classes most relevant for you 62 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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63 If you do want to test syntax, use a parser, eg. by Will Critchlow: www.realrobotstxt.com 63 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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64 Go multi-level to successfully control which content can be accessed by AI crawlers 64 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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65 65 • Multilingual Tech SEO Strategist of 15 years • Turned PM Driving Growth in Global Markets • Ask me about complex tech issues, B2B SaaS SEO, and… • … my paper for the IAB Workshop on AI Control. Current role: PM Search at DeepL 65 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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Thank you! 66

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67 Read on here: https://www.robotstxt.org/faq/legal.html

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68 How your robots.txt can become a liability You’re exposing vulnerabilities of your website or servers • Outdated folders with sensitive data • Server vulnerabilities (Apache server status) • Admin login paths in your CMS • Internal services 68 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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69 How your robots.txt can become a liability You’re relying on your robot.txt to keep things out of the internet • Mitigate scraping attacks • Restrict access to personal data • Avoid duplicate content issues (why not target the root cause?) • Get things out of the index you accidentally leaked 69 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa

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70 How your robots.txt can become a liability You’re not monitoring the content or uptime of your robots.txt • Inhouse teams make changes without aligning with you • CMS plugins can change it without that being their purpose / disclosure in their release notes 70 BrightonSEO | @gianna-brachetti-truskawa