GoogleAPI is a bot in the webhook senders category, operated by Google.
APIs-Google is the user agent used by Google APIs to deliver push notification messages. Application developers can request these notifications to avoid the need for continually polling Google's servers to find out if the resources they are interested in have changed. To make sure nobody abuses this service, Google requires developers to prove that they own the domain before allowing them to register a URL with a domain as the location where they want to receive messages.
Webhook senders call your endpoints to deliver events from payment, messaging and SaaS platforms. Blocking them breaks integrations. Allow them on the webhook paths they need and nowhere else.
GoogleAPI identifies itself with this user agent string:
APIs-Google (+https://developers.google.com/webmasters/APIs-Google.html)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.
We have not confirmed whether GoogleAPI 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.
User-agent: APIs-Google Disallow: /
User-agent: APIs-Google Disallow: /private/ Disallow: /search
User-agent: APIs-Google Allow: /blog/ Disallow: /
User-agent: APIs-Google Allow: / User-agent: * Disallow: /
User-agent: APIs-Google group, GoogleAPI ignores your User-agent: * rules, so repeat any that should still apply.APIs-Google from GoogleAPI's user agent; check Google's own documentation if it publishes a different robots.txt name.Treat robots.txt as a statement of your policy, and enforce it where requests arrive.
Allow GoogleAPI if it is a service you use, and keep its visits out of page views and ad requests either way.
Transfon Security for publishersGoogleAPI is not a person. Exclude it from campaign and conversion data so reports reflect real visitors.
Transfon Security for advertisersAllow GoogleAPI only if it works for your store, and keep it away from cart and checkout.
Transfon Security for e-commerceIf GoogleAPI is a service you use, allow it on the endpoints it needs and block it elsewhere.
Transfon Security for SaaS and APIsrobots.txt is a request, not an enforcement. Transfon Security shows GoogleAPI 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
GoogleAPI is a bot in the webhook senders category, operated by Google. APIs-Google is the user agent used by Google APIs to deliver push notification messages. Application developers can request these notifications to avoid the need for continually polling Google's servers to find out if the resources they are interested in have changed. To make sure nobody abuses this service, Google requires developers to prove that they own the domain before allowing them to register a URL with a domain as the location where they want to receive messages.
We have not confirmed whether GoogleAPI 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.
Add "User-agent: APIs-Google" followed by "Disallow: /" to the robots.txt file at the root of your site. To enforce it, block requests whose user agent contains "APIs-Google" at your WAF. In Transfon Security that is one User Agent block rule.
No. robots.txt is voluntary, so GoogleAPI may not follow it, and anyone can send GoogleAPI's user agent, so a fake GoogleAPI ignores your rule. Enforce the rule where requests arrive, at your WAF, and check the source network.
Webhook senders call your endpoints to deliver events from payment, messaging and SaaS platforms. Blocking them breaks integrations. Allow them on the webhook paths they need and nowhere else.
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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