Password Protection

[Patti]

I've just discovered that some of my graphics are being stolen by hotlinking to them. I have never used the password protect feature. Is it foolproof to stop that from happeneing? And can someone direct me to instructions on how to set this up. Thanks for any help.
Patti

[Frank Broughton]

Hello Patty,

In your Cpanel go to the section called "Hot Link Protection." You can then click on the option to "Enable" hotlink protection. You can choose the type of files you want protected - .jpg .gif .ra .rm - whatever.

There is no such thing as "foolproof" when it come to computers and especially the Internet. There are ways around almost everything. But it will stop the average Sue or Joe!

[Gwaihir]

Note that password protection and hotlink protection are quite different things. The first will require anyone to give a username and password before they can see anything. The latter will prevent your images from being hotlinked to reliably. (I.e. you can't actually stop anyone from making the link, but in most cases the server just won't give the desired image to a visitor not on your own site. This makes hotlinking unattractive to any culprit and saves you most of the bandwith associated with it as well.)