How do you protect a download page?

Hi,

So I would like to give some tips in this thread on how to protect the download page.

There are many options with a paid service like DL guard. But we are going to see how to protect it without using an expensive or monthly service.

1.) Open your robots.txt file
for the meta tag "robots" instead of it being index,follow-which means it will spider everything including your files. it needs to read index,nofollow which tells the spider to index the main page only.

2 Do not name your download page thanks thankyou thank_you download dl or any other similar extension there are a ton of people who do black hat searches and easily uncover any files the search engine may have spidered.

instead use something like xzchfgtdjnl123.html something that is somewhat encrypted that only you would know. is the best idea
Encrypting the page via php where you can request log in information
<?php

// Define your username and password
$username = "someuser";
$password = "somepassword";

if ($_POST['txtUsername'] != $username || $_POST['txtPassword'] != $password) {

?>

<h1>Login</h1>

<form name="form" method="post" action="<?php echo $_SERVER['PHP_SELF']; ?>">
<p><label for="txtUsername">Username:</label>
<br /><input type="text" title="Enter your Username" name="txtUsername" /></p>

<p><label for="txtpassword">Password:</label>
<br /><input type="password" title="Enter your password" name="txtPassword" /></p>

<p><input type="submit" name="Submit" value="Login" /></p>

</form>

<?php

}
else {

?>

<p>This is the protected page. Your private content goes here.</p>

<?php

}

?>

paste the above code in a page after editing with your details and save it as validate.php

Next in the pages you want to protect you would put this at the very top
<?php include 'validate.php'; ?>
Also because there are tricks that can be done in a search engine for specific search words it is a good idea to not use usual lingo like" thank you here is your download or thanks etc. instead try Th[a]nks {p}lease Receive ]your products] below.
something that will not show up as a straight string.I recently discovered a product of mine was open and free so I found ways to help prevent that so I thought I would pass it on.

punch in your download url on google or yahoo or whatever and see if it comes up in search results People can and do try anything to bypass security but it could help someone who reads it to protect their files.


***Edit you can also just password protect your files directory by logging in to password protect directory in your cpanel-you may need to ask your host where to find this.
You can add users with their own password manually.
Cheers
-WD