ANTI-HOTLINKING for videos
 

Just finished a little script to protect against video hotlinking.


http://tools.webspacemania.com/vprotect/1/fudge.wmv

Basically what the script does is disables videos unless the person linking or hotlinking the video has a banner for the site displayed..

http://tools.webspacemania.com/vprotect/make.php
now visit this page you will see a banner.. close it and come back and try the link again and you will notice the video works fine now

If anyone is interested in the details let me know.

This is a GREAT move for sponsors, as it allows you to ALLOW your affiliates to hotlink your videos easily AND promote your site while disallowing blatant hotlinking..

There are many features that can be added to provide even more functionality. such as adding popups if people try to hotlink the videos ( but still allowing the video to be played ) or displaying alternate videos

Its also built to allow individual banners for each video before they can have access ( so they cant just view the banner once then view all the videos )

p.s. its really easy to add to your existing site.

I thought up the idea while i had my afternoon nap and coded and installed it in less than half an hour. all you gotta do is put it in place

figure i would bump this as i dont see many people utilizing any sort of hotlink protection for videos

its actually pretty cool because the end url cannot be detected . well it can but its useless.

The actual url of the video is in a folder with your ip in it.. so when you view the image it records your ip , it checks ip log , if your not on it you get served a diff video, if you ARE on the list having viewed the banner , then the folder containing the video is renamed to your ip , and then you are sent there.. :) although if you gotta shitload of people theres a diff way of doing it ( as the folder might get renamed before the last guy has finished watching

basically your forwarding your videos from one folder to another thus your perm video link always stays the same but the real video link is changing all the time , so if anyone copies it ( the real url ) , it will work for a short time ( or in the above case it would only work for them )

very nice man!

I would grab it from you, but my new tours are all using flash video embeds

Can't believe you have gotten more response than this?

Very nice code, champ. I will be looking into it (and perhaps I cant host it on a site I own? The code that is).

Hey that's pretty cool! Send me an email if you are interested in licensing it out.

Cheers,

Brad

well i always enjoy sharing my ideas so i'll post some dirty code here for your programmers to clean up for free.

If you want something custom i would be happy to create something cool for you for whatever time is costs me.

Mad stuff as usual, Smokey!!

Very Nice!!

I'm glad you bumped this thread I almost missed it! Awesome job Smokey!

theres an easier way to do it..
make a .htaccess file and redirect all requests to video files to a php script (sending of course the name of the file requested)

in the php file check to see if the person is 'allowed' to download the file (cookie, referer, ip, whatever) and use readfile() to let the user download the file if its ok; otherwise u can send em to another file, or a website (header(Location:.... ))

I wouldn't recommend posting your code here.. Even if it's dirty, it might have some value - your idea is inevidably worth something to multiple parties. We're always looking for neat tools to give to our clients for free. Shit, I spent 5 digits so that we could give MojoHost clients LinkSentinal (antihotlinking protection created by the makers of ProxyPass)... for free.

:)

Brad

5 digits? :1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh

One Two Three Four Five :thumbsup

It's a great product, much more sophisticated than you are anticipating.

Brad

i like to be linkhotted

thats basically what this does , ceptin your method wouldnt really allow affiliates to hotlink your videos..

I invented this method for sponsors so anyone displaying a banner for the appropriate site can display or even embed the videos..

Booooooooooooooooooo :(

when the request for the image is called, the ip can be added to the database (or cookie sent, etc); then when the video is called it will see that the ip is allowed to download the file =)

thats basiclly what im doing in a nutshell..

Not saying its some huge complicated process , but i dont see many people using it.

not that much for a script that might save just one customer 6 digits (over a few months or less)
And yes he might have been able to find it cheaper but still if something works and is top notch ... don't refrain from paying a fair price.

I think it's actually great of him to try to add value to his services :thumbsup

Cool idea!

Why thank you :winkwink:

Everybody that does MGPs and has video heavy tours could benefit from movie hotlink protection. Saves a ton of headache and bandwidth, we think!

Brad

I found that solution on google 4 years ago

using symlinks instead of renaming would solve that problem...

Would something like this work for a guy who just builds movie galleries and gets say 500K unique visitors per day?

If it can handle that kind of load I'm very interested

i dont think that should be a problem..

I'll toss the code here sometime today

LinkSentinal can certainly handle that load! Or, if you want a host to work with you to put this script into use just give me a call/email/icq :)

Brad

Cool idea!:drinkup

are you referring to this? and if so, does this work?:

http://www.safalra.com/programming/p...nt-hotlinking/

I would really appreciate getting that script. I was going to send you a message but I can't seem to see a way to contact you.

Thanks.

dunno but thats kind of what im doing but i think he made it alot more complicated.. dont worry ill post the code here when i have a second to write up how t o use it , tonight or tomorrow

Very nice job Smokey, although I was kinda hoping for a crash at the end of that race... Have I been watching too much youtube? :)