What is Catchpoint?

Catchpoint is a bot in the monitoring and analytics bots category, operated by Catchpoint.

Bot name
Catchpoint
Operator
Catchpoint
Type
Bot
Respects robots.txt
Not confirmed
robots.txt user agent
Catchpoint
Signs requests (Web Bot Auth)
No

About Catchpoint

Our mission has remained the same from day one: to prioritize monitoring and observability from the end-user perspective.

Monitoring bots check uptime, performance and page changes on behalf of a site owner or a third party. Allow the services you run yourself and exclude them from analytics so they do not inflate page views.

Catchpoint user agent

Sample user agent strings sent by Catchpoint:

  • Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; Catchpoint)
  • Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; Android 4.1.1; Nexus 7 Build/JRO03D; Catchpoint) AppleWebKit/535.19 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/18.0.1025.166 Safari/535.19
  • Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; Catchpoint) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/75.0.3770.90 Safari/537.36

Anyone can copy a user agent string. Transfon Security also checks where each request comes from, so a request that claims to be a known crawler but comes from the wrong network is treated as a fake, not as the real crawler.

How to block Catchpoint in robots.txt

We have not confirmed whether Catchpoint follows robots.txt. Add a rule, then check your logs to see that it stopped. robots.txt is a plain text file at the root of your domain, such as https://example.com/robots.txt.

Block Catchpoint from the whole site

User-agent: Catchpoint
Disallow: /

Block Catchpoint from some folders

User-agent: Catchpoint
Disallow: /private/
Disallow: /search

Allow Catchpoint only on some folders

User-agent: Catchpoint
Allow: /blog/
Disallow: /

Allow Catchpoint and block other crawlers

User-agent: Catchpoint
Allow: /

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

Things to know

  • Each host needs its own file. Rules on www.example.com do not apply to shop.example.com.
  • A crawler obeys only the most specific group that names it. Once you add a User-agent: Catchpoint group, Catchpoint ignores your User-agent: * rules, so repeat any that should still apply.
  • The user agent name is not case sensitive. We take Catchpoint from Catchpoint's user agent; check Catchpoint's own documentation if it publishes a different robots.txt name.
  • Crawlers cache robots.txt, so changes can take up to a day to apply. Disallow stops crawling but does not remove pages already collected or indexed.

Limits of robots.txt

  1. Catchpoint may not follow the rule. robots.txt is a request that nothing enforces, and we have not confirmed that Catchpoint follows it. Check your logs after adding a rule.
  2. The user agent could be fake. robots.txt matches the name a request claims. Anyone can send Catchpoint's user agent, and a scraper using it is not bound by Catchpoint's robots.txt policy. Only checking the source network tells a real Catchpoint from a fake one.

Treat robots.txt as a statement of your policy, and enforce it where requests arrive.

Who should care about Catchpoint

Publishers

Allow Catchpoint if it is a service you use, and keep its visits out of page views and ad requests either way.

Transfon Security for publishers

Media buyers and advertisers

Catchpoint is not a person. Exclude it from campaign and conversion data so reports reflect real visitors.

Transfon Security for advertisers

E-commerce

Allow Catchpoint only if it works for your store, and keep it away from cart and checkout.

Transfon Security for e-commerce

SaaS and APIs

If Catchpoint is a service you use, allow it on the endpoints it needs and block it elsewhere.

Transfon Security for SaaS and APIs

Block Catchpoint with Transfon Security

robots.txt is a request, not an enforcement. Transfon Security shows Catchpoint by name in the Top Bots report, so you can see how often it visits and which pages it reads. Block or allow it with a User Agent rule, or slow it down with a rate limit decision rule.

Transfon Security

Control Catchpoint on your site

  • See every Catchpoint visit and the pages it reads
  • Spot bots that fake trusted crawler names
  • Block, allow or rate limit Catchpoint with one rule
  • Works with or without robots.txt support

Frequently asked questions

What is Catchpoint?

Catchpoint is a bot in the monitoring and analytics bots category, operated by Catchpoint. Our mission has remained the same from day one: to prioritize monitoring and observability from the end-user perspective.

Does Catchpoint respect robots.txt?

We have not confirmed whether Catchpoint follows robots.txt. Add a robots.txt rule, then check your logs to see that it stopped, and block it by user agent if it did not.

How do I block Catchpoint?

Add "User-agent: Catchpoint" followed by "Disallow: /" to the robots.txt file at the root of your site. To enforce it, block requests whose user agent contains "Catchpoint" at your WAF. In Transfon Security that is one User Agent block rule.

Is robots.txt enough to block Catchpoint?

No. robots.txt is voluntary, so Catchpoint may not follow it, and anyone can send Catchpoint's user agent, so a fake Catchpoint ignores your rule. Enforce the rule where requests arrive, at your WAF, and check the source network.

Should I block Catchpoint?

Monitoring bots check uptime, performance and page changes on behalf of a site owner or a third party. Allow the services you run yourself and exclude them from analytics so they do not inflate page views.

Related bots

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See Which Bots Visit Your Site

Transfon Security identifies every bot in this directory in your traffic reports, flags fake search crawlers, and lets you allow, block or rate limit each bot.

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