Guest access and htaccess

[truongcoi]

Hello,

For a couple of weeks now our forum has been seeing the same IP range (France) trying access in large numbers every day. The access try probably comes from a bot as it stops with guest access and viewing the first page, never trying to register.

An htaccess file entry placed on the server which should result in an access error message to the other party has no effect, athough in other cases they ceased coming.

My question is, is it normal that the SMF 'Who's online' still shows the IPs of the bot(s) despite the htaccess file preventing access? Is there any way they could get around it if the whole range is blocked?

Thanks.

[LiroyvH]

An htaccess file entry placed on the server which should result in an access error message to the other party has no effect, athough in other cases they ceased coming.

My question is, is it normal that the SMF 'Who's online' still shows the IPs of the bot(s) despite the htaccess file preventing access? Is there any way they could get around it if the whole range is blocked?

Depends on what you've set the time to and when they last visited. If you've set it very high, such as "active in the past 24 hours" and you've added the htaccess entry 1 hour ago: then yeah, they could still appear. If more time has elapsed than your threshold, then no it shouldn't show and I'd double check if your htaccess rule is setup properly and is actually working. (Eg: replace with your own IP and see if it actually blocks you.)