AI search fix
Nginx: allow AI bots safely
To allow AI bots safely in Nginx, define explicit conditions for trusted crawler user agents and keep default protections for unknown automation. Nginx should return normal 200 responses to allowed bots on public pages and avoid accidental blocks from generic anti-bot snippets copied into server blocks. Server policy must match robots.txt: if one layer allows and another denies, crawl behaviour becomes inconsistent. After changes, test with logs and sample user-agent requests. Allowing AI bots improves access; it does not guarantee citations.
Many Nginx setups inherit deny rules from old templates that catch trusted bots. Review all included config files and inherited server blocks before editing a single location directive — a hidden include may still return 403 to GPTBot.
Nginx rollout checklist for AI bots
- Document trusted AI user agents and desired policy per bot.
- Audit existing deny or challenge directives in every included config file.
- Add narrow allow logic for trusted bots on public HTML routes.
- Retain rate limits and abuse controls for unknown bot traffic.
- Reload config safely and verify with logs plus test requests.
You'll receive an HTML report highlighting crawler access issues before and after server rule changes.
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